Polymer-Grafted Nanoparticle Translocation in Strongly Confining Nanochannels*

The process of a particle moving from one region to another through a channel is central to many physical systems, including viral infection and water filtration. In this talk, we discuss the conformation of polymers that are grafted to a spherical nanoparticle surface, and the effect this has on the translocation of the particle through a single, confining nanochannel. Using self-consistent field theory (SCFT) coupled with Poisson-Nernst-Planck (PNP) theory, we investigate the distortion of the grafted polymer layer for nanoparticles undergoing translocation in strongly confining nanochannels, as well as the expected signatures that would be observed experimentally.