Scaling arguments used to predict the radius of gyration of passive self-avoiding flexible polymers have been shown to hold for polymers under the influence of active fluctuations. In this Letter, we establish how the standard blob scaling theory representation of a polymer, capable of capturing the essential physics of passive polymers under a variety of settings, breaks down when dealing with active polymers under confinement. Using numerical simulations, we show how the predicted exponents associated to the forces applied by a polymer when restricted within cavities of different geometries hold only whenever the persistence length generated on the polymer by the active forces is much smaller than the size of the characteristic blob in the scaling theory.

• Received 15 April 2019

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.123.087802