Phase separation in salt-free symmetric mixtures of oppositely charged rodlike polyelectrolytes is studied using quasi-analytical calculations. Stability analyses for the isotropic-isotropic and the isotropic-nematic phase transitions in the mixtures are carried out and demonstrate that electrostatic interactions favor nematic ordering. Coexistence curves for the symmetric mixtures are also con...

K E V I N M . S I R K , † N A V I D B . S A L E H , ‡ T A N A P O N P H E N R A T , ‡ H Y E J I N K I M , ‡ B R U N O D U F O U R , § J E O N G B I N O K , § P A T R I C I A L . G O L A S , § K R Z Y S Z T O F M A T Y J A S Z E W S K I , § G R E G O R Y V . L O W R Y , ‡ A N D R O B E R T D . T I L T O N * , † , | Center for Environmental Implications of Nanotechnology and Departments of Chemic...

Here we present a novel surface modification method based on the sequential layer-by-layer deposition of polyelectrolytes yielding hydrophilic microchannels in PDMS-based microfluidic devices. The coatings are long-term stable and allow for the generation of monodisperse oil-in-water microdroplets even several months after the channel surface treatment. Due to the robustness of the polyelectrol...

We present a short overview over recent MD simulations of systems of fully flexible polyelectrolyte chains with explicitly treated counter ions using the full Coulomb potential. The main emphasis is given on the conformational properties of the polymers, with a short discussion on counter ion condensation.

Using exact results from the theory of completely integrable systems of the Painlevé/Toda type, we examine the consequences for the theory of polyelectrolytes in the (nonlinear) Poisson-Boltzmann approximation.