Solubility-temperature pseudophase diagram

As it has been outlined earlier, finite-size systems usually exhibit a zoo of crossover- or pseudo-transitions, most of which disappear in the thermodynamic limit. These peculiarities of finite systems are also relevant for the polymer adsorption problem considered here. 

The Icolor code in Fig, 13,2 encodes the value of the specific heat and the brighter the shading, the larger the value of cy. Black and white lines emphasize the ridges of the profile. The specific heat profile typically is a reasonable quantity for the identification of pseudophases and, therefore, these ridges mark pseudophase boundaries. As expected, the pseudophase diagram is divided into two main parts - the phases of adsorption and desorption. The two desorbed pseudophases DC (desorbed-compact conformations) and DE (desorbed-expanded structures) are separated by the collapse transition line which 

4 Pseudophase diagram of a flexible polymer near an attractive substrate 

Furthermore, highlighted by white fines, there are transitions in between the major phases. These subphases are dominated by finite-size effects and do not survive in the thermodynamic limit. This concerns, e.g., the higher-order layering transitions among the compact pseudophases AC2ai -d. In the following sections we will analyze the properties of the structural phases in detail. 

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