Study of the conformations of the molecules in amorphous polymers by computer simulation

It is investigated by computer simulation whether space problems prevent a closing packing of chain molecules if the chain molecules are randomly coiled. Chains consisting of 100 beads were introduced into a primitive cubic lattice in such a way that each lattice point is occupied by not more than one bead. It was possible to occupy up to 88% of the lattice points. The average square end-to-end distance of the chains in the concentrated system is the same as for a single chain. Neither perfect chain bundles nor imperfect chain bundles occur in a considerable amount. This shows that it is possible to pack closely randomly coiled chains.