Journal of Surfactants and Detergents

Conductances of hexadecylpyridinium bromide (HPyBr) + tetradecyltrimethylammonium bromide (TTAB) mixtures over the entire mole fraction range of HPyBr (αHPyBr) were measured in pure water as well as in the presence of various aqueous ethylene glycol oligomers containing 10 and 30 wt% of each additive in their respective binary mixtures at 30°C. Each conductivity curve shows two breaks corresponding to two critical micelle concentrations (cmc; C1 and C2 over the whole mole fraction range of HPyBr + TTAB mixtures except in the presence of pure HPyBr and TTAB, where a single break was observed. From the conductivity data, various micellar paramelers in the absence and presence of glycol additives were computed. A variation in the micellar parameters in the presence of additive showed that additive introduction mainly influence the medium properties and therefore the micellar properties. However, no significant micelle-glycol interactions were observed even with an increase in the number of repeating units from ethylene glycol to polyethylene glycol 600. The mixing behavior of HPyBr + TTAB is close to nonideal and is identical in pure water and in the presence of various glycols. This has been attributed to the presence of synergistic interactions between unlike monomers at C1 that are not influenced even by the presence of additives. The appearance of the second cmc is mainly attributed to structural transitions of the mixed micelles at C1 with a further increase in surfactant concentration.

Some enzymes are considerably more stable when formulated with nonionic surfactants than when formulated with anionic surfactants. The effect of a nonionic surfatant, polyoxyethylene mono-N-dodecyl ether (Brij 35; number of units of ethylene oxide moieties, 23), on the kinetic behavior of hydrolysis of amylopectin with Bacillus amyloliquefaciens α-amylase (BAA) was studied at a temperature of 25°C and a pH of 7.0. The hydrolytic rate was accelerated by the addition of the nonionic surfactant above its critical micelle concentration. Lineweaver-Burk plots for the enzymatic hydrolysis in the absence and presence of the nonionic surfactant at 0.5 to 2.5% (wt/vol) had linear relationships, and the kinetic parameters, K m and k cat were obtained. The value of k cat was increased with an increased concentration of Brij 35, whereas the K m value was approximately constant. Therefore, the increase in k cat contributed to the acceleration of the apparent hydrolytic rate. The interaction of amylopectin with the surfactant was examined by a surface tension measurement, and the result confirmed the corresponding binding between the substrate and the surfactant. A fluorescence analysis due to tryptophan in BAA suggested that BAA bound to the nonionic micelles. The increase in k cat suggested that hydrolytic catalysis at the micellar pseudophase was more efficient than that at the aqueous pseudophase. The enhancement of the catalytic rate contributed to the effective removal of food stains containing starch when BAA was added with Brij 35 in a laundry detergent washing test.

Silicone surfactants are inevitably involved in industrial applications in combination with hydrocarbon surfactants, but properties of the mixtures of silicone and hydrocarbon surfactants have received little attention, especially foam properties of the mixtures. In this study, aqueous solutions of respective binary mixtures of a nonionic silicone surfactant with anionic, cationic, and nonionic hydrocarbon surfactants were prepared for evaluation of their foam properties. Surface tension of aqueous solutions of the mixtures were measured with the maximum bubble pressure method. Foaming ability and foam stability of the mixtures were then evaluated with the standard Ross–Miles method. The findings show that the addition of the silicone surfactant results in a decrease in surface tension for aqueous solutions of the hydrocarbon surfactants. The critical micelle concentration (CMC) of the hydrocarbon surfactants is also changed by the additive silicone surfactant. Additionally, clear foam synergistic effects were observed in the mixtures of silicone and hydrocarbon surfactants, regardless of the ionic types of the hydrocarbon surfactant. The foam stability of the hydrocarbon surfactant was shown to generally improve with the increasing concentration of the silicone surfactant. Even so, aqueous solutions of different ionic hydrocarbon surfactants in the presence of the silicone surfactant will give different foam stabilities. The results of the present study are meant to provide guidance for the practical application of foams generated by the mixtures of the silicone and hydrocarbon surfactants.

In previous work, a microemulsion-based formulation approach yielded excellent laundry detergency with hydrophobic oily soils hexadecane and motor oil. In this work, the same approach is used in detergency of triolein, which is a model triglyceride, some of the most difficult oils to be removed from fabric. The linker concept was applied in formulation of the microemulsion system. Three different surfactants were used: (i) dihexyl sulfosuccinate, an ionic surfactant with a moderate hydrophile-lipophile balance (HLB); (ii) secondary alcohol ethoxylate, a lipophilic nonionic surfactant with a very low HLB; and (iii) alkyl diphenyl oxide disulfonate (ADPODS), a hydrophilic anionic surfactant with a very high HLB. The phase behavior and interfacial tension (IFT) of the surfactant systems were determined with different concentrations of ADPODS. The results indicate that as the HLB of the system increases, a higher salinity is required to shift the phase transition from Winsor Type I to Type III to Type II. The three formulations at different salinities were used in detergency experiments to remove triolein from polyester/cotton sample fabric. The results showed that there were two peaks of maximum detergency in the range of salinity from 0.1% to 10% NaCl. The higher the hydrophilicity of the system, the higher the salinity required for maximum detergency. The results of the dynamic IFT and the detergency performance from two rinsing methods lead to the hypothesis that one of these maxima in detergency results from a spreading or wetting effect. The other maximum in detergency is believed to be related to ultralow IFT associated with oil/water middle-phase microemulsion formation. Triolein removal exceeding 80% was attained, validating the microemulsion approach to detergency.

The foaming performance of 1-tetradecyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide (C14mimBr) aqueous solution, in the presence of polymers (PEG or PVA) or inorganic salts (NaBr, MgCl2, NaNO3, Na2SO4 or Na3PO4), was investigated at 25.0 °C by using the self-made apparatus and the conductivity method. The experimental results show that the foaming ability and foam stability of the ternary aqueous systems of C14mimBr coexisting with PEG or PVA are stronger than those of the C14mimBr solutions in the absence of a polymer, and both the efficiency of foaming ability and foam stability of the surfactant solutions are evidently enhanced with an increase in polymer concentration. However, the addition of inorganic salts can decrease the foaming ability and foam stability of C14mimBr solution. Especially, the inorganic salts, with high valence state of the anion (SO4 2− and PO4 3−), are good antifoam agents which can remove and inhibit foam quickly. For the aqueous solution of the surfactant, the effect of temperature on foaming properties was also examined. The results show that both the foaming ability and stability of the foams of the surfactant solutions decrease with an increase in the temperature within the range from 25.0 to 45.0 °C.

The ultimate objective of the project was to investigate the relationship between microemulsion phase behavior and detergency for oily soils. In this study, surfactant phase behavior was evaluated for hexadecane and motor oil as model oily soils. Producing microemulsions with these oils is particularly challenging because of their large hydrophobic character. To produce the desired phase behavior we included three surfactants with a wide range of hydrophilic/lipophilic character: alkyl diphenyl oxide disulfonate (highly hydrophilic), dioctyl sodium sulfosuccinate (intermediate character), and sorbitan monooleate (highly hydrophobic). This mixed surfactant was able to bridge the hydrophilic/lipophilic gap between the water and the oil phases, producing microemulsions with substantial solubilization and ultralow interfacial tension. The effects of surfactant composition, temperature, and salinity on system performance were investigated. The transition of microemulsion phases could be observed for both systems with hexadecane and motor oil. In addition, the use of surfactant mixtures containing both anionic and nonionic surfactants leads to systems that are robust with respect to temperature compared to single-surfactant systems. Under conditions corresponding to “supersolubilization”, the solubilization parameters and oil/microemulsion interfacial tensions are not substantially worse than at optimal condition for a middle-phase system, so a middle-phase microemulsion is not necessary to attain quite low interfacial tensions. A potential drawback of the formulations developed here is the fairly high salinity (e.g., 5 wt% NaCl) needed to attain optimal middle-phase systems. The correlation between interfacial tension and solubilization follows the trend predicted by the Chun-Huh equation.

Alkyldimethyl (C n DMPO) with chain lengths of n = 8 (octyl), 10 (decyl), 12 (dodecyl), and 14 (tetradecyl) as well as alkyldiethyl (C n DEPO) phosphine oxides with chain lengths of n = 10, 12, and 14 were synthesized and purified to study how the adsorption properties and the location of the miscibility gap of these surfactants depend on the size of the head group and on the length of the alkyl chain. After surfactant purification, the surface tension isotherms were determined from which the cmc, the minimum surface tension σcmc, the maximum surface concentration Γmax, and the minimum surface area A min were obtained. As expected, for one homologous series, a decrease in the cmc and an increase in Γmax was observed with increasing alkyl chain length. For two surfactants of the same alkyl chain length, the cmc values of the C n DEPO surfactants are approximately two times lower than those of the C n DMPO surfactants. However, the Γmax values of C n DEPO are lower than those of C n DMPO as two ethyl chains are sterically more demanding than two methyl chains. In addition to the adsorption properties, the location of the miscibility gap as a function of the alkyl chain length and the head group size was studied. Its location depends on the total number of carbon atoms and not primarily on the length of the main alkyl chain. This observation reflects the decreasing water solubility which can be tuned by increasing the length of either the main alkyl chain or of the shorter head group chains.

A new type of sulfobetaine with double alkyl polyoxyethylene (n) ether chains, dicoconut oil alcohol polyoxethylene (n) ether methylhydroxylpropyl sulfobetaine (diC12–14E n HSB) was synthesized using a commercial nonionic surfactant, coconut oil alcohol polyoxethylene (n) ether, as raw material and its properties as a surfactant for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) in the absence of alkali was studied. The purified product is a mixture of homologues with mainly C12/C12, C12/C14 and C14/C14 alkyl chains and widely distributed EO chains (n = 2.2 on average) with an average molar mass of 742.6 g/mol. The diC12–14E2.2HSB has an improved aqueous solubility at 25 °C compared with didodecylmethylhydroxylpropyl sulfobetaine (diC12HSB), a homologue without an EO chain, and is highly surface active as reflected by its low CMC (4.6 × 10−6 mol/L), high saturated adsorption (6.8 × 10−10 mol/cm2) and small cross sectional area (0.24 nm2/molec.) at the air/water interface. With a hydrophile–lipophile balance well matched with Daqing crude oil/connate water system, the sulfobetaine can reduce Daqing crude oil/connate water interfacial tension to ultra-low values at 45 °C in the absence of alkali, and displays a low saturated adsorption at the sandstone/water interface (0.0024 mmol/g), reduced by 69 and 92 % respectively in comparison with that of the corresponding carboxyl betaine, diC12–14E2.2B and its homologue without an EO chain, didodecylmethylcarboxyl betaine (diC12B). With these excellent properties diC12–14E2.2HSB gives a high tertiary recovery, 18.4 % original oil in place, when mixed with other hydrophobic and hydrophilic sulfobetaines in surfactant-polymer (SP) flooding free of alkali. The insertion of EO chains in combination with the replacement of carboxyl betaine by sulfobetaine is therefore very efficient for improving the properties of the double chain hydrophobic carboxyl betaines as surfactants for SP flooding free of alkali.

During reformulation of a liquid laundry detergent, an undesirable color change was observed: the normally blue color of the formulation was found to turn green when exposed to elevated temperatures during accelerated stability testing. Spectroscopic analysis revealed formation of a yellow substance, whose transmission spectrum combined with that of the blue dye to yield the observed green color. Sequential solid phase extraction using cation and anion exchange indicated the yellow substance was a base. Liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry (LC–MS) analysis of the isolate demonstrated a series of related compounds whose elemental composition and fragmentation suggested polyethenyl imines (PEIs). These results support a mechanism involving metal-catalyzed oxidative degradation of triethanolamine (TEA) with subsequent acetaldehyde-mediated formation of conjugated PEIs as primary factors responsible for the observed color change.