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Spontaneous emulsification at the water/oil interface

2012; Elsevier BV; Volume: 399; Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/j.colsurfa.2012.02.032

1873-4359

Jesús Santana-Solano, Carla M. Quezada, Sandra Ozuna‐Chacón, José Luis Arauz-Lara,

Fluid Dynamics and Mixing

Abstract Emulsification processes usually require the application of external energy to enlarge the interfacial area between both media. We study here a case where practically no external energy is required to form an emulsion, i.e., it is produced spontaneously when both liquids are put in contact in the presence of one surfactant species. We report the observation and measurements of the kinetics of the spontaneous formation and growth of water droplets at the water/oil + lipophilic surfactant interface. The droplets can reach sizes up to several microns, and their growth is found to obey a power law for a range of the surfactant concentration.