Semidilute polymer solution

A solution above the polymer overlap concentration but below the concentrated regime, with interpenetrating chains. Local polymer structure is characterized by a correlation length or concentration-blob size. Scaling formulas describe a broad semidilute regime most reliably when the concentration greatly exceeds overlap while remaining small compared with one in volume fraction.

A region of size $\xi$ containing a typical correlated chain segment whose internal monomer concentration matches the bulk concentration. If it contains $g$ statistical units with isolated size law $\xi \sim b{g}^{\nu }$ and unit volume $v_0$, concentration matching gives $\varphi \sim g{v}_0/{\xi }^3$. Eliminating $g$ gives $\xi \sim b(\varphi b^3/v_0{)}^{-\nu /(3\nu -1)}$. Numerical prefactors and distinctions among scattering, osmotic and geometric correlation lengths require additional definitions.

For an ideal chain inside a blob, $\nu =1/2$ and $\xi \sim b\sqrt{g}$. Together with $\varphi \sim g{v}_0/{\xi }^3$, this gives the displayed concentration-blob size. Under the site-volume approximation $v_0\sim b^3$, $\xi \sim b/\varphi$ and $g\sim {\varphi }^{-2}$. The estimate describes local overlap rather than the full chain size and requires $1\ll g\ll N$ for a well-developed semidilute regime.