Exposure of self-assembly interiors to external elements. A kinetic approach

Five cationic surfactants, each bearing a single sulfur at various locations along their chains, were adsorbed into sodium dodecyl sulfate micelles. An oxidant, periodate, was added to the system, and the subsequent rate of thioether oxidation to sulfoxide, determined by NMR, was found to be diminished (more or less equally for all sulfur loci) by 2 orders of magnitude. In contrast, rates of hydrogen peroxide oxidation were hardly perturbed by micellization. Once again, however, there was no rate dependence on sulfur location within the chains. These results are interpreted in terms of a disordered micelle in which all chain positions have roughly equivalent access to the micelle surface. The kinetic method for assessing exposure to the external medium is applicable to self-assemblies and polymer systems wherever the NMR resolution so permits.