Monte Carlo determination of the distribution of ions about a cylindrical polyelectrolyte

Abstract

We report a calculation of the distribution of small ions around a charged cylinder representing a polyelectrolyte molecule in solution. The Monte Carlo method of Metropolis, Rosenbluth, and Teller was used to avoid the inaccuracies known to be associated with the Poisson‐Boltzmann equation. The systems examined contained a long polyelectrolyte cylinder with charge parameter, χ, equal to 4.2, corresponding approximately to a DNA molecule. In one model, the cylinder had charges on its axis and an exclusion radius to the center of the small ions equal to 10 Å, while the small ions had various radii in the range from 1 to 10 Å and one or two protonic charges. Various systems were studied; some had one species of small ion alone, others had mixtures of different types. The results showed good agreement with the solution of the Poisson‐Boltzmann equation when only the species with 1‐Å radius was present, but considerable discrepancies appeared with larger ions as a result of excluded volume interactions between the latter. Deviations from the Poisson‐Boltzmann equation also appeared when both positive and negative small ions were present; the deviations were in the direction of a higher concentration of both counter‐ and co‐ions, but particularly co‐ions, close to the polyelectrolyte. In another model, the charges were arranged along two helices on the surface of the cylinder; the resulting radial distribution of small ions was not much different from that found when the charges were situated on the axis. In all cases there was a striking accumulation of counterions in a layer of concentration exceeding 1 mol/L at the surface of the polyion.