Polymer models with optimal good-solvent behavior.

We consider three different continuum polymer models, which all depend on a tunable parameter r that determines the strength of the excluded-volume interactions. In the first model, chains are obtained by concatenating hard spherocylinders of height b and diameter rb (we call them thick self-avoiding chains). The other two models are generalizations of the tangent hard-sphere and of the Kremer-Grest models. We show that for a specific value [Formula: see text], all models show optimal behavior: asymptotic long-chain behavior is observed for relatively short chains. For [Formula: see text], instead, the behavior can be parametrized by using the two-parameter model, which also describes the thermal crossover close to the θ point. The bonds of the thick self-avoiding chains cannot cross each other, and therefore the model is suited for the investigation of topological properties and for dynamical studies. Such a model also provides a coarse-grained description of double-stranded DNA, so that we can use our results to discuss under which conditions DNA can be considered as a model good-solvent polymer.