GOALI: Structure-Property-Processing Relationships of Concentrated Surfactant Solutions

该项目的目标是确定常用化学添加剂和制造工艺对浓缩表面活性剂溶液的影响。浓缩表面活性剂溶液用于配制以洗涤剂为基础的产品，用于清洁、洗衣和其他个人护理。更好地了解溶液的结构-性能-加工关系将使工业能够更有效地生产浓缩溶液，以实现所需的性能和性能，同时还可以实现可持续发展目标，如减少配方液体的用水量。因此，该项目产生的新知识最终将导致与洗涤剂产品相关的经济和环境成本的降低，以及与全球卫生有关的重要公共卫生措施的相应收益。该项目是普渡大学师生与宝洁公司技术人员的合作项目，为普渡大学的毕业生和本科生提供宝贵的行业经验和职业发展机会。除了研究活动，还将与宝洁合作创建实验室模块和讲座演示，通过将表面活性剂溶液的物理模型与在线计算工具相结合的引人入胜的动手方法，向工程学学生讲授相图的基础知识。含有不同添加剂的模型层状表面活性剂溶液将通过一系列流变学、散射和双折射实验以及流体动力学建模和中试工艺研究来进行研究。这些结果将有助于评估常用配方添加剂和加工路线对表面活性剂溶液的多尺度结构和性能的影响，包括表面活性剂双层间距、厚度和弯曲模数。除了研究常规的十二烷基硫酸酯表面活性剂外，研究小组还将研究一类更可持续、更环保的微生物生物表面活性剂。项目成果包括：(1)经过实验验证的本构模型，将片状结构表面活性剂浓缩液的宏观动力学与表面活性剂双层膜的纳米和微尺度特性联系起来；(2)预测加工图，最终创建具有所需微观结构和最终使用性能的规模化表面活性剂浓缩液。预计项目成果将与清洁和个人护理以外的各种领域相关，包括环境补救、表面活性物质制造和基于脂质的疫苗开发。该项目将建立在20世纪90年代初进行的关于液晶表面活性剂流体流动行为和剪切对流体微观结构影响的基本实验研究的基础上，以及最近使用原位流变学测量将幂定律剪切稀化流变学与浓缩表面活性剂溶液中令人惊讶的壁面滑移和推流联系起来的工作。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The goal of this project is to determine how concentrated surfactant-based solutions are affected by common chemical additives and manufacturing processes. Concentrated surfactant solutions are used to formulate detergent-based products for cleaning, laundry, and other personal care. A better understanding of the solution’s structure-property-processing relationships will enable industry to more efficiently manufacture concentrated solutions to achieve desired properties and performance while also meeting sustainability goals such as reducing water from formulated liquids. Thus, the new knowledge resulting from this project will ultimately lead to reduced economic and environmental costs associated with detergent-based products as well as corresponding gains in important public health measures related to global hygiene. This project is a collaboration between faculty and students at Purdue University and technical staff at The Procter and Gamble Company (P&G), providing the Purdue graduate and undergraduate students with valuable industrial experiences and professional development opportunities. In addition to the research activities, lab modules and lecture demos will be created in collaboration with P&G to teach the fundamentals of phase diagrams to engineering students through an engaging, hands-on approach coupling physical models of surfactant solutions with online computational tools. Model lamellar-structured surfactant solutions containing different additives will be investigated through a series of rheophysical, scattering, and birefringence experiments coupled with fluid dynamic modeling and pilot-scale processing studies. The results will hep evaluate the impact of common formulation additives and processing routes on the multiscale structures and properties of surfactant solutions, including surfactant bilayer spacing, thickness, and bending moduli. In addition to studying conventional dodecyl sulfate surfactants, the research team will also investigate a class of microbial biosurfactants, which are more sustainable and environmentally friendly. Project deliverables include: (1) experimentally validated constitutive models that connect macroscale dynamics of concentrated lamellar-structured surfactant solutions with nano- and micro-scale characteristics of surfactant bilayers; and (2) predictive processing maps to ultimately create concentrated surfactant solutions at scale with a desired microstructure and end-use performance. Project outcomes are expected to be relevant to a variety of areas beyond cleaning and personal care, including environmental remediation, surfactant manufacturing, and lipid-based vaccine development. This project will build upon fundamental experimental studies that were performed in the early 1990s on the flow behavior of liquid crystalline surfactant fluids and the impact of shear on the fluid’s microstructure as well as recent work that used in situ rheophysical measurements to connect power-law shear thinning rheology with the surprising occurrence of macroscale wall slip and plug flow in concentrated surfactant solutions.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.