Journal of Chemical Physics, Vol.117, No.20, 9460-9464, 2002
Electrostatic attraction between ionic reverse micelles with dielectric discontinuity
We have calculated the thermally-averaged electrostatic attractive potential between two spherical ionic reverse micelles in a medium of a different dielectric constant. Specifically the attractions between the charge density fluctuations in one micelle and interface polarizations on the other are computed. For water-in-oil microemulsions, we find that these contributions completely overwhelm those from correlated fluctuations in charge densities between two micelles.