Interfacial Thermal Conductance Between a Polyethylene Glycol Polymer Chain and Water: A Molecular Dynamics Study

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Babaei, Shadi, Cheraghali, Yekta, Loison, Claire, Rajabpour, Ali, Merabia, Samy
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
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author Babaei, Shadi
Cheraghali, Yekta
Loison, Claire
Rajabpour, Ali
Merabia, Samy
author_facet Babaei, Shadi
Cheraghali, Yekta
Loison, Claire
Rajabpour, Ali
Merabia, Samy
contents Understanding interfacial heat transfer between polymers and water is crucial for the design of biomaterials, drug delivery platforms, and nanofluidic systems. In this study, we employed all atom molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to quantify the interfacial thermal conductance between a polyethylene glycol (PEG) 36mer chain and explicit water over the temperature range of 280-350 K. To compare the conformational behavior of the PEG chain, we examined its radius of gyration and observed a temperature dependent chain collapse consistent with previous coarse grained models. By employing a transient non equilibrium MD approach, we imposed temperature difference across the interface and analyzed the energy relaxation behavior to compute heat transfer across the polymer water interfaces. Our results demonstrate that both temperature and interfacial interaction strength influence interfacial thermal conductance, with temperature playing the dominant role. Structural factors such as chain conformation and interfacial area were found to mediate the effect of interfacial interaction. Additional analysis of the vibrational density of states (VDOS) and the mean square displacement (MSD) reveal that vibrational coupling has minimal impact on thermal conductance across interfaces, whereas increased water thermal motion enhances energy transfer. These findings highlight the structural and dynamical origins of interfacial thermal conductance and provide atomistic insights into the tuning of interfacial heat transport in molecular systems through temperature and solvent interactions.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2512_03174
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Interfacial Thermal Conductance Between a Polyethylene Glycol Polymer Chain and Water: A Molecular Dynamics Study
Babaei, Shadi
Cheraghali, Yekta
Loison, Claire
Rajabpour, Ali
Merabia, Samy
Soft Condensed Matter
Understanding interfacial heat transfer between polymers and water is crucial for the design of biomaterials, drug delivery platforms, and nanofluidic systems. In this study, we employed all atom molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to quantify the interfacial thermal conductance between a polyethylene glycol (PEG) 36mer chain and explicit water over the temperature range of 280-350 K. To compare the conformational behavior of the PEG chain, we examined its radius of gyration and observed a temperature dependent chain collapse consistent with previous coarse grained models. By employing a transient non equilibrium MD approach, we imposed temperature difference across the interface and analyzed the energy relaxation behavior to compute heat transfer across the polymer water interfaces. Our results demonstrate that both temperature and interfacial interaction strength influence interfacial thermal conductance, with temperature playing the dominant role. Structural factors such as chain conformation and interfacial area were found to mediate the effect of interfacial interaction. Additional analysis of the vibrational density of states (VDOS) and the mean square displacement (MSD) reveal that vibrational coupling has minimal impact on thermal conductance across interfaces, whereas increased water thermal motion enhances energy transfer. These findings highlight the structural and dynamical origins of interfacial thermal conductance and provide atomistic insights into the tuning of interfacial heat transport in molecular systems through temperature and solvent interactions.
title Interfacial Thermal Conductance Between a Polyethylene Glycol Polymer Chain and Water: A Molecular Dynamics Study
topic Soft Condensed Matter
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.03174