Monitoring the Transition from Spherical to Polymer‐like Surfactant Micelles Using Small‐Angle X‐Ray Scattering

• DOI: 10.1002/anie.201406489
• Publication Date: 2014-09-05T00:14:29Z
• Authors: Grethe Vestergaar...; Reidar Lund; Jérémie Gummel; Theyencheri Naray...; Jan Skov Pedersen
• Keywords: Small-angle X-ray scattering; Sodium dodecyl sulfate

Despite over a century of modern surfactant science, the kinetic pathways morphological transitions in micellar systems are still not well understood. This is mainly as result lack sufficiently fast methods that can capture structural changes such transitions. Herein, simple system consisting sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) aqueous NaCl solutions investigated. Combining synchrotron radiation small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) with stopped-flow mixing schemes allows monitoring process where polymer-like micelles formed from globular when salt concentration suddenly increased. The results show "worm-like" by fusion and short cylinders fashion bears similarities to step-like polymerization process.