SELF-AVOIDING WALKS WITH WRITHE

We map self-avoiding random walks with a chemical potential for writhe to the three-dimensional complex O(N) Chem-Simons theory as N --> 0. We argue that at the Wilson-Fisher fixed point which characterizes nor mal self-avoiding walks (with radius of gyration exponent nu approxima te to 0.588) a small chemical potential for writhe is irrelevant and t he Chern-Simons field does not modify the monomer-monomer correlation function. For a large chemical potential the polymer collapses. (C) 19 97 Elsevier Science B.V.