Linker Formation in an Overcharged Complex of Two Dendrimers and Linear Polyelectrolyte

The complexes formed by two dendrimers with charged terminal groups and oppositely charged long linear polyelectrolyte (LPE) have been studied using Brownian dynamics simulations. The structural properties of the complexes and their dependence on the LPE chain length were investigated. It was observed that dendrimers in the considered complexes are Sufficiently overcharged; i.e., the number of adsorbed LPE monomers is larger than required for the neutralization. The degree of overcharging increases with the increase of the LPE length and is accompanied by the linker appearance until saturation in overcharging is reached. Nonmonotonic dependence of the linker size oil the LPE length was observed. To describe the Structural properties of the complexes formed by two macroions and a polyelectrolyte chain, the correlation theory has been developed.