Abstract
The broadening of the most intense lines observed in the X-ray diffraction patterns has been used to determine the domain sizes of hexagonal liquid crystals in C12EO8/water/alcohol systems. A linear “master” relationship between the sizes and the distance to the isotropic phase-transition boundary line (H1 → Wm) was observed as the temperature, surfactant, and glycerol volume fractions were varied. This linear relationship is interpreted as the feature of a “glassy” state formed by the crystallites, which grow until their glass-transition temperature is attained. The master relationship indicates that both temperature and volume fraction induce the glass transition, hindering a further growth of the crystal domains. A fractal dimension close to one for these cylindrical domains is obtained, and an estimation of the number of bounded cylinders inside a domain has been made. For systems containing propylene glycol and propanol, the observed increase in domain size on approaching the phase boundary is much larger than for glycerol systems, which seems to be related to the different influence of the alcohols on the surfactant aggregation and its structure, as it was previously reported for these alcohols. A large increase of the domain sizes by aging the samples, as it is usually observed for common glassy systems, is also reported.
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