Statistical Physics of Macromolecules

Partial Contents: 1. Ideal Polymer Chain. A Freely Jointed Chain. Flexibility of a Polymer Chain. Size of an Ideal Polymer Chain. 2. Polymer Chains with Volume Interactions. Basic Definitions and Methods. Polymer Chain Models of Systems with Volume Interactions. Basic Definitions in the Theory of Volume Interactions in Polymer Systems. Perturbation Theory for Polymer Coils with Volume Interactions. 3. Single Macromolecule with Volume Interactions. Swelling of a Polymer Coil in Good Solvent (excluded volume problem). Renormalization Group and S-expansion Methods Applied to the Excluded Volume Problem. Properties of Polymer Coils with Excluded Volume (the scaling concept and the notion of a blob). 4. Polymer solutions and melts. Basic Preliminary Data and Definitions. Theory of Polymer Solutions and Melts in the Self-Consistent Field Approximation. Appendix. Flory Lattice Theory of Polymer Solutions and Melts. 5. Other Polymer Systems. Polymer Mixtures and Block Copolymers. Liquid- Crystal Polymers. High Elasticity of Polymer Networks. Methods of Polymer Network Synthesis. 6. Dynamic Properties of Polymer Solutions and Melts. The Rouse Model: a Phantom Chain in Immobile Solvent. The