Canonical partition function, conformational

The conformational properties of a polymer chain and phase transition phenomena can be understood if one has the complete information about the partition function ofthe chain. In the lattice model, the canonical partition function of a polymer chain is calculated (Domb and Lebowitz 1989) by enumerating all possible walks of a given length. For example, we show total number of conformations (C ) for N step walk in O Table 8-1. The grand canonical partition function defined in O Eq. 8.15 can be written as... 

The canonical partition function of the restricted conformational space thus reads... 

This analysis can be tentatively based on the denaturant binding model by Aune and Tanford [206], The model assumes that urea or GuHCI can bind to different independent sites of native and denatured conformations of the protein. Following this line, the DSC trace obtained in the presence of these denaturants can be simulated (see Appendix A4.2) according to the canonical partition function formalism [162,197],... 

The first of these developments is perturbation theory. Its application to solution theory was perhaps first made by H. C. Longuet-Higgins in his conformal solution theory (Longuet-Higgins 1951). The formal theory of statistical mechanical perturbation theory is very simple in the canonical ensemble. If denotes the intermo-lecular potential energy of a classical A-body system (not necessarily the sum of pair potentials), the central problem is to evaluate the partition function. 

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