The effect of solvent quality on dilute and semi-dilute regimes of polymers
in solution is studied by means of Monte Carlo simulations. The equation of
state, adsorptions near a hard wall, wall-polymer surface tension and effective
depletion potentials are all calculated as a function of concentration and
solvent quality. We find important differences between polymers in good and
theta solvents. In the dilute regime, the physical properties for polymers in a
theta solvent closely resemble those of ideal polymers. In the semi-dilute
regime, however, significant differences are found.Comment: 10 pages, 13 figure