Temperature Triggered Structural Transitions in Surfactant organized Self Assemblies

Abstract

Preparation & characterization of tunable fluids is an emerging area with potential application in many fields. Surfactants self assemble in aqueous solution to give a rich variety of phase structures, the size and shape of which can be tuned by additives like salts, alcohols, amines, aromatics etc or external stimuli such as light, temperature etc. The addition of long chain aliphatic alcohol has significant influence on the surfactant aggregation, as it promotes morphological growth of micelles. The cationic surfactant, Cetyl Trimethyl Ammonium Bromide (CTAB) with nonanol in presence of potassium bromide (KBr) shows thermo tunable viscosity behaviour and optical switching behaviour. The solution is visually observed to transform from a turbid and less viscous phase at low temperature to clear and considerably viscous phase at high temperature. Temperature induced changes in turbidity and viscosity are consistent with the transition from vesicle to worm like micelle. It is also worth emphasizing that the transition is thermo reversible, so that vesicles that are disrupted into micelles upon heating can be reformed upon cooling. The thermo tunable transition from turbid to transparent state and the concomitant changes in viscosity are promising for the use in smart windows, monitoring of tumor growth or in other stimuli based application.