Effect of salt and surfactant concentration on the structure of polyacrylate gel/sutrfactant complexes
Journal article, 2007

Small-angle X-ray scattering was used to elucidate the structure of crosslinked polyacrylate gel/ dodecyltrimethylammonium bromide complexes equilibrated in solutions of varying concentrations of surfactant and sodium bromide (NaBr). Samples were swollen with no ordering (micelle free), or they were collapsed with either several distinct peaks (cubic Pm3n) or one broad correlation peak (disordered micellar). The main factor determining the structure of the collapsed complexes was found to be the NaBr concentration, with the cubic structure existing up to similar to 150 mM NaBr and above which only the disordered micellar structure was found. Increasing the salt concentration decreases the polyion mediated attractive forces holding the micelles together causing swelling of the gel. At sufficiently high salt concentration the micelle-micelle distance in the gel becomes too large for the cubic structure to be retained, and it melts into a disordered micellar structure. As most samples were above the critical micelle concentration, the bulk of the surfactant was in the form of miscelles in the solution and the surfactant concentration thereby had only a minor influence on the structure. However, in the region around 150 mM Nal3r, increasing the surfactant concentration, at constant NaBr concentration, was found to change the structure from disordered micellar to ordered cubic and back to disordered again.

DENSITY

MICROGELS

OPPOSITELY CHARGED SURFACTANT

KINETICS

DODECYL-SULFATE

IONIC SURFACTANTS

MIXTURES

BEHAVIOR

CUBIC PHASE I1

POLYELECTROLYTE GEL

Author

P. Nilsson

Uppsala University

Johan Unga

Chalmers, Chemical and Biological Engineering

P. Hansson

Uppsala University

Journal of Physical Chemistry B

1520-6106 (ISSN) 1520-5207 (eISSN)

Vol. 111 37 10959-10964

Subject Categories

Chemical Engineering

DOI

10.1021/jp074112p

More information

Latest update

2/28/2018