TY - JOUR A1 - Majee, Arghya A1 - Bier, Markus A1 - Blossey, Ralf A1 - Podgornik, Rudolf T1 - Charge symmetry broken complex coacervation T2 - Physical Review Research N2 - Liquid-liquid phase separation has emerged as one of the important paradigms in the chemical physics as well as biophysics of charged macromolecular systems. We elucidate an equilibrium phase separation mechanism based on charge regulation, i.e., protonation-deprotonation equilibria controlled by pH, in an idealized macroion system which can serve as a proxy for simple coacervation. First, a low-density density functional calculation reveals the dominance of two-particle configurations coupled by ion adsorption on neighboring macroions. Then a binary cell model, solved on the Debye-Hückel as well as the full nonlinear Poisson-Boltzmann level, unveils the charge symmetry breaking as inducing the phase separation between low- and high-density phases as a function of pH. These results can be identified as a charge symmetry broken complex coacervation between chemically identical macroions. KW - Aggregation, Biomolecular self-assembly, Electrostatic interactions, Charged colloids, Colloids, Proteins, Density functional calculations, Polymers & Soft Matter, Biological Physics, Statistical Physics Y1 - 2020 UR - https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-fhws/frontdoor/index/index/docId/2474 UR - https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.2.043417 VL - 2 IS - 4 ER -