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Linking probabilities of off-lattice self-avoiding polygons and the effects of excluded volume. (English) Zbl 1157.82053

Summary: We evaluate numerically the probability of linking, i.e. the probability of a given pair of self-avoiding polygons (SAPs) being entangled and forming a nontrivial link type \(L\). In the simulation we generate pairs of SAPs of \(N\) spherical segments of radius \(r_{d}\) such that they have no overlaps among the segments and each of the SAPs has the trivial knot type. We evaluate the probability of a self-avoiding pair of SAPs forming a given link type \(L\) for various link types with fixed distance \(R\) between the centers of mass of the two SAPs. We define normalized distance \(r\) by \(r=R/R_{g, 0_1} \) where \(R_{g, 0_1} \) denotes the square root of the mean square radius of gyration of SAP of the trivial knot \(0_{1}\). We introduce formulae expressing the linking probability as a function of normalized distance \(r\), which gives good fitting curves with respect to \(\chi ^{2}\) values. We also investigate the dependence of linking probabilities on the excluded-volume parameter \(r_{d}\) and the number of segments, \(N\). Quite interestingly, the graph of linking probability versus normalized distance \(r\) shows no \(N\)-dependence at a particular value of the excluded volume parameter, \(r_{d} = 0.2\).

MSC:

82D60 Statistical mechanics of polymers
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