Self-avoiding rings at the theta point

Nature of the collapse transition in interacting self-avoiding trails

We study the interacting self-avoiding trail (ISAT) model on a Bethe lattice of general coordination q and on a Husimi lattice built with squares and coordination q=4. The exact grand-canonical solutions of the model are obtained, considering that up to K monomers can be placed on a site and associating a weight ω_{i} with an i-fold visited site. Very rich phase diagrams are found with nonpolymerized, regular polymerized, and dense polymerized phases separated by lines (or surfaces) of continuous and discontinuous transitions. For a Bethe lattice with q=4 and K=2, the collapse transition is identified with a bicritical point and the collapsed phase is associated with the dense polymerized (solidlike) phase instead of the regular polymerized (liquidlike) phase. A similar result is found for the Husimi lattice, which may explain the difference between the collapse transition for ISATs and for interacting self-avoiding walks on the square lattice. For q=6 and K=3 (studied on the Bethe lattice only), a more complex phase diagram is found, with two critical planes and two coexistence surfaces, separated by two tricritical and two critical end-point lines meeting at a multicritical point. The mapping of the phase diagrams in the canonical ensemble is discussed and compared with simulational results for regular lattices.

Solution of a model of self-avoiding walks with multiple monomers per site on the Husimi lattice

We solve a model of self-avoiding walks which allows for a site to be visited up to two times by the walk on the Husimi lattice. This model is inspired in the Domb-Joyce model and was proposed to describe the collapse transition of polymers with one-site interactions only. We consider the version in which immediate self-reversals of the walk are forbidden. The phase diagram we obtain for the grand-canonical version of the model is similar to the one found in the solution of the Bethe lattice, with two distinct polymerized phases: a tricritical point and a critical endpoint.

Solution of a model of self-avoiding walks with multiple monomers per site on the Bethe lattice

We solve a model of self-avoiding walks with up to two monomers per site on the Bethe lattice. This model, inspired in the Domb-Joyce model, was recently proposed to describe the collapse transition observed in interacting polymers [J. Krawczyk, Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 240603 (2006)]. When immediate self-reversals are allowed (reversion-allowed model), the solution displays a phase diagram with a polymerized phase and a nonpolymerized phase, separated by a phase transition which is of first order for a nonvanishing statistical weight of doubly occupied sites. If the configurations are restricted forbidding immediate self-reversals (reversion-forbidden model), a richer phase diagram with two distinct polymerized phases is found, displaying a tricritical point and a critical end point.