Entropic Charge Separation as a General Mechanism Arresting Nanoscale Condensate Coarsening.

Authors

Feipeng Chen, Jiaxing Yuan, Yaojun Zhang, Hajime Tanaka, Ho Cheung Shum

Published in

Physical review letters. Volume 136. Issue 22. Pages 228202. Jun 05, 2026.

Abstract

Classical liquid-liquid phase separation predicts that droplets grow continuously via Brownian coalescence or Ostwald ripening, yet many nanoscale biomolecular condensates remain stable for hours or days without active regulation. Such condensates often arise through complex coacervation between oppositely charged macromolecules, making this interaction motif broadly relevant in biology and soft matter. Here we combine experiments, theory, and simulations to identify a merging-limited coarsening (MLC) regime in which merging of condensates decreases sharply below a critical droplet size. Chain-length asymmetry between oppositely charged polymers drives entropic interfacial charge separation even at globally neutral stoichiometry, imparting net droplet charges and generating long-range electrostatic repulsion. These size-dependent barriers lead to exponential rather than classical power-law growth and trap droplets in long-lived metastable states. Our framework unifies suppressed MLC and classical Brownian coalescence within a single predictive model and provides a general mechanism for condensate stability in both synthetic systems and living cells.

PMID:
42330462
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 23 Jun 2026.

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