Swelling and shrinking kinetics of a lamellar gel phase

Abstract

We investigate the swelling and shrinking of L_beta lamellar gel phases composed of surfactant and fatty alcohol after contact with aqueous poly(ethylene-glycol) solutions. The height change $\Delta h(t)$ is diffusion-like with a swelling coefficient, S: $\Delta h=S\sqrt{t}$. On increasing polymer concentration we observe sequentially slower swelling, absence of swelling, and finally shrinking of the lamellar phase. This behavior is summarized in a non-equilibrium diagram and the composition dependence of S quantitatively described by a generic model. We find a diffusion coefficient, the only free parameter, consistent with previous measurements.

3 pages, 4 figures to appear in Applied Physics Letters

References in corpus (3)

• Mesoscale simulations of surfactant dissolution and mesophase formation
• Molecular Dynamics Simulation of Solvent-Polymer Interdiffusion. I. Fickian diffusion
• On the stability and growth of single myelin figures