Monte Carlo study of heteroarm star copolymers in good and selective solvents

Lattice Monte Carlo simulations of conformations of heteroarm star copolymers A(n)B(n) in selective solvents were performed using a special variant of the Siepman and Frenkel algorithm. The effects of solvent quality, the number and lengths of blocks on the collapse of the insoluble block A, segregation of the two types of blocks and the behavior of the soluble blocks B were studied mainly for "hairy" stars containing high numbers of long arms. The simulation shows that insoluble blocks collapse in strongly selective solvents and the gravity centers of soluble and insoluble blocks separate which suggests the possibility of the formation of nonspherical structures.