Langmuir, Vol.19, No.18, 7219-7225, 2003
Properties of mixed alcohol-zwitterionic surfactant films in quaternary water-in-oil microemulsions
Contrast variation small-angle neutron scattering (SANS) has been employed to study the droplet structure and adsorbed layer composition of water-in-n-octane microemulsions, stabilized by alcohol-zwitterionic surfactant (1,2-n-octanoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine or PC8) mixtures. The role of coadsorbed alcohol was investigated by systematically varying the chain length N-alc (5,n-pentanol; 6,n-hexanol; 8,n-octanol) under conditions where the interface would be "saturated" with added alcohol. The SANS intensities are consistent with spherical nanodroplets and a progressive decrease in mixing of alcohol into the film with increasing alcohol chain length N-alc. These scattering data have also been analyzed to provide estimates for film bending energies in terms of the sum of moduli 2K + K-bar, which is found to be an increasing function of N-alc. These results quantify the interfacial partitioning of alcohols and highlight the effects of chain length on interfacial compositions and stability.