Adsorption and Depletion of Polyelectrolytes in Charged Cylindrical System within Self-Consistent Field Theory

Self-consistent field theory (SCFT) is presented to study the adsorption of flexible polyelectrolytes (PE) onto uniformly oppositely charged cylinders. We focus on the curvature effect of adsorbing surface on the adsorption−depletion phase-transition-like behavior. Numerical solutions for SCFT functions are derived. In terms of the scaling expression (C salt ∗ ∼ p ασβ) of the critical quantities, i.e., the salt concentration C salt ∗, the …