Mesoscopic simulation of polymer–solvent phase separation: linear chain behaviour and branching effects

Recently, a method was presented to model phase separation behaviour of polymer–solvent mixtures around the lower critical solution temperature using dissipative particle dynamics (DPD) [Macromol Theory Simul 9 (2000) 698]. In the current article, a refined version of this method is described, yielding good agreement with the classic Flory–Huggins model. However, the great advantage of DPD, over such classical theories, is its ability to incorporate structural properties without additional parameters. This will be demonstrated on the case of branched polymers, for which DPD correctly predicts the cloud point pressure lowering experimentally observed.