Bending elasticity of adsorbed oil-water interfaces: direct measurement and relevance to oil sands engineering

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

It is well known that oil and water do not mix. However, if an appropriate concoction of surfactants (similar to soap molecules) were added to the system, it is possible for the immiscible liquids to blend on the nanometre scale, effectively forming a homogeneous solution. This blending of oil and water can find important applications in such diverse areas as oil sands engineering, food science, and drug delivery. The physical property which controls the nano-scale blending of oil and water is the bending stiffness of the interface (i.e. the dividing surface between oil and water). In this project, novel micromechanical techniques will be developed to quantify the bending stiffness of the liquid interface. The experiments will be conducted on the micrometre length scale (about one tenth the thickness of a human hair), and the procedure will involve analysing the random fluctuations of a very flexible interfacial surface. By balancing the randomizing effect (temperature) with the restoring force (bending resistance of the interface), it is possible to calculate the bending stiffness of the liquid interface.