LM thesis proposal
Supervisor: Raffaello Potestio (raffaello.potestio@unitn.it)
In spite of their simplicity, lattice models of polymers are capable of providing a substantial qualitative and even quantitative insight in the physics of real polymeric macromolecules. A still open problem is the design of polymers featuring desired characteristics, that is, to define a sequence of monomers with known chemical properties such that the whole macromolecule displays a specific (structural or thermodynamical) behaviour.
This project aims at addressing this problem in general terms, establishing a link between the sequence of the polymer and the resulting thermodynamics. This analysis will be carried out making use of the well-known relationship existing between the location of zeroes of a system’s partition function and its thermodynamic properties.
This project is framed in the context of the VARIAMOLS ERC project; the student will have access to the computational resources of the research group.
