{"term":{"id":"02517","title":"freely jointed chain","longtitle":"IUPAC Gold Book - freely jointed chain","doi":"10.1351\/goldbook.F02517","code":"F02517","status":"current","definitions":[{"id":1,"text":"A hypothetical linear chain molecule consisting of infinitely thin rectilinear segments uniform in length; each segment can take all orientations in space with equal probability, independently of its neighbours. For models in which the segments are not all uniform in length, the name 'random-walk chain' has been used.","contexts":[],"links":[{"term":"linear chain","url":"https:\/\/goldbook.iupac.org\/\/terms\/view\/L03546"},{"term":"probability","url":"https:\/\/goldbook.iupac.org\/\/terms\/view\/P04855"}],"sources":["Purple Book, 1st ed., p. 50 (http:\/\/old.iupac.org\/publications\/books\/author\/metanomski.html)"]}],"altoutputs":{"html":"https:\/\/goldbook.iupac.org\/terms\/view\/F02517\/html","xml":"https:\/\/goldbook.iupac.org\/terms\/view\/F02517\/xml","plain":"https:\/\/goldbook.iupac.org\/terms\/view\/F02517\/plain"},"citation":"Citation: 'freely jointed chain' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351\/goldbook.F02517","license":"The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/4.0\/) for individual terms.","collection":"If you are interested in licensing the Gold Book for commercial use, please contact the IUPAC Executive Director at executivedirector@iupac.org .","disclaimer":"The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using.","accessed":"2026-06-05T03:27:32+00:00"}}