Journal
JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR GRAPHICS & MODELLING
Volume 53, Issue -, Pages 221-227Publisher
ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC
DOI: 10.1016/j.jmgm.2014.07.014
Keywords
Lattice Monte Carlo; Mixed micellization; Gemini surfactant; Conventional surfactant; Synergism
Ask authors/readers for more resources
In the current study, we have investigated the micellization of pure gemini surfactants and a mixture of gemini and conventional surfactants using a 3D lattice Monte Carlo simulation method. For the pure gemini surfactant system, the effects of tail length on CMC and aggregation number were studied, and the simulation results were found to be in excellent agreement with the experimental results. For a mixture of gemini and conventional surfactants, variations in the mixed CMC, interaction parameter beta, and excess Gibbs free energy G(E) with composition revealed synergism in micelle formation. Simulation results were compared to estimations made using regular solution theory to determine the applicability of this theory for non-ideal mixed surfactant systems. A large discrepancy was observed between the behavior of parameters such as the activity coefficients f(i) and the excess Gibbs free energy G(E) and the expected behavior of these parameters as predicted by regular solution theory. Therefore, we have used the modified version of regular solution theory. This three parameter model contains two parameters in addition to the interaction parameters: the size parameter, rho, which reflects differences in the size of components, and the packing parameter, P*, which reflects nonrandom mixing in mixed micelles. The proposed model provides a good description of the behavior of gemini and conventional surfactant mixtures. The results indicated that as the chain length of gemini surfactants in mixture is increased, the size parameter remains constant while the interaction and packing parameters increase. (C) 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available