Diffusion of flexible, charged, nanoscopic molecules in solution: Size and pH dependence for PAMAM dendrimer

Maiti, Prabal K and Bagchi, Biman (2009) Diffusion of flexible, charged, nanoscopic molecules in solution: Size and pH dependence for PAMAM dendrimer. In: Journal of Chemical Physics, 131 (21).

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Abstract

In order to understand self-diffusion (D) of a charged, flexible, and porous nanoscopic molecule in water, we carry out very long, fully atomistic molecular dynamics simulation of PAMAM dendrimer up to eight generations in explicit salt water under varying pH. We find that while the radius of gyration (R-g) varies as N-1/3, the self-diffusion constant (D) scales, surprisingly, as N-alpha, with alpha=0.39 at high pH and 0.5 at neutral pH, indicating a dramatic breakdown of Stokes-Einstein relation for diffusion of charged nanoscopic molecules. The variation in D as a function of radius of gyration demonstrates the importance of treating water and ions explicitly in the diffusion process of a flexible nanoscopic molecule. In agreement with recent experiments, the self-diffusion constant increases with pH, revealing the importance of dielectric friction in the diffusion process. The shape of a dendrimer is found to fluctuate on a nanosecond time scale. We argue that this flexibility (and also the porosity) of the dendrimer may play an important role in determining the mean square displacement of the dendrimer and the breakdown of the Stokes-Einstein relation between diffusion constant and the radius.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Journal of Chemical Physics
Publisher:	American Institute of Physics.
Additional Information:	Copyright of this article belongs to American Institute of Physics.
Department/Centre:	Division of Physical & Mathematical Sciences > Physics
Date Deposited:	06 Mar 2010 09:19
Last Modified:	19 Sep 2010 05:56
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/25994

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