General patterns of the phase behavior of mixtures of H2O, alkanes, alkyl glucosides, and cosurfactants
Author
Summary, in English
We demonstrate how rather hydrophilic surfactants can be used for solubilizing simultaneously water and alkane. The required hydrophilic-lipophilic balance can be achieved by the addition of a medium-chain alcohol, that is, a hydrophobic cosurfactant. Specifically, the phase behavior of the quaternary water-n-octane-n-octyl beta-glucopyranoside (C(8)G(1))-n-octanol (C8E0) system has been investigated. Sugar surfactants, in general, are hydrophilic and, because of the comparatively large number of hydroxyl groups, much less temperature-sensitive than the well-known alkylpolyglycolether (CiEj) surfactants. Therefore, one has to resort to tuning the phase behavior by mixing with a hydrophobic cosurfactant. Once this is done, the phase behavior mimics that of water-alkane-CiEj microemulsions. To show this, the trajectory of the middle-phase is determined as the phase inversion is passed. A scaling of the trajectory onto the trajectories of conventional temperature-sensitive ternary microemulsions is possible after the composition (i.e. the fraction of n-octanol) of the mixed amphiphilic film is determined from phase behavior and density measurements.
Department/s
Publishing year
2002
Language
English
Pages
3058-3067
Publication/Series
Langmuir
Volume
18
Issue
8
Document type
Journal article
Publisher
The American Chemical Society (ACS)
Topic
- Physical Chemistry
Status
Published
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 0743-7463