Polymer-surfactant systems

含有聚合物和表面活性剂的水系统在大量商业产品的配方中显示出各种各样的特性，但同样吸引着研究人员。表面活性剂和聚合物在水溶液中的聚集是由亲水性、疏水性和离子相互作用的微妙平衡所控制的。疏水聚集、粘度增强、凝胶形成、增溶、相分离等过程都可以控制，甚至可以根据特定的应用和要求进行定制。如果考虑到诸如药物传递和转染等应用领域，疏水修饰的“天然”聚合物（例如从多糖中提取的聚合物）更有可能获得批准，但由于许多复杂的实验因素，这些系统尚未像基于HM合成聚合物的系统那样得到广泛的研究。在这个项目中，我们合成了某些HM多糖，并研究了它们与表面活性剂的相互作用，即使在相对较低的表面活性剂和聚合物浓度下，溶液粘度也有很高的提高。目的是了解表面活性剂结合、溶液流变、中性和带电疏水分子在高粘度溶液或表面活性剂介导的“动态”凝胶中的增溶作用的变化，以及pH或溶剂条件等外部因素对这些特性的控制。

Aqueous systems containing both polymers and surfactants display a wide variety of properties useful in the formulation of a large range of commercial products, but equally fascinating to the researcher. The aggregation of surfactants and polymers in aqueous solution is governed by the subtle balance of hydrophilic, hydrophobic and ionic interactions. Processes such as hydrophobic aggregation, viscosity enhancement, gel formation, solubilization, phase separation, etc. can all be controlled and even tailored to particular applications and requirements.If areas of application such as drug delivery and transvection are considered,  hydrophobically modified "natural" polymers, such as those derived from polysaccharides, are more likely to find approval but due to a number of complex experimental factors such systems have not been studied as widely as those based on HM synthetic polymers. In this project, we synthesize certain HM polysaccharides, and study their interactions with surfactants in relation to the very high enhancements in solution viscosity observed even at relatively low surfactant and polymer concentrations. The objective is to understand the variations in surfactant binding, solution rheology, and the solubilization of neutral and charged hydrophobic molecules in high viscosity solutions or surfactant mediated "dynamic" gels, and the control of these properties by external factors such as pH or solvent conditions.