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Spontaneous Vesicles and other Solution Structures in Catanionic Mixtures

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Abstract

We have prepared spontaneous, single-walled, equilibrium vesicles of controlled size and surface charge from aqueous mixtures of simple, commercially available, single-tailed cationic and anionic surfactants. We believe vesicle formation results from the production of anion-cation surfactant pairs which then act as double-tailed zwitterionic surfactants. Although unilamellar vesicles have been created by numerous physical and chemical techniques from multilamellar dispersions, all such vesicle systems revert to the equilibrium, multilamellar phase over time. These catanionic vesicles are stable for periods as long as several years and appear to be the equilibrium form of aggregation. Here we review the phase behavior and structural studies of several such mixtures, with particular focus on the effect of surfactant tail lengths on size and location of the vesicle phase in the appropriate phase diagram. The approach to equilibrium is also discussed.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge many useful discussions with Jacob Israelachvili, Fyl Pincus, Sam Safran, and Fred Mackintosh on the theoretical aspects of spontaneous vesicles. JANZ acknowledges financial support from the National Science Foundation (CBT 86-57444) and the Petroleum Research Fund, administered by the ACS, for partial support of this work. EWK acknowledges support from the University of Delaware Research Foundation, The Clorox Company, and the National Science Foundation (PYIA 83-51179 and CTS 91-02719).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, 19716, USA

    Eric W. Kaler & Kathleen L. Herrington

  2. Department of Chemical and Nuclear Engineering and Materials Engineering, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, 93106, USA

    Joseph A. N. Zasadzinski

Authors
  1. Eric W. Kaler
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  2. Kathleen L. Herrington
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  3. Joseph A. N. Zasadzinski
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Kaler, E.W., Herrington, K.L. & Zasadzinski, J.A.N. Spontaneous Vesicles and other Solution Structures in Catanionic Mixtures. MRS Online Proceedings Library 248, 3–10 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1557/PROC-248-3

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