Interfacial Surfactant Ordering in Thin Films of SDS-Encapsulated Single-Walled Carbon Nanotubes

The molecular self-assembly of surfactants on the surface of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) is currently a common strategy for the tuning of nanotube properties and the stabilization of carbon nanotube dispersions. Here, we report direct measurements of the degree of interfacial ordering for sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) surfactants adsorbed on colloidal, single-chirality enriched, SWCNTs within a solid film and investigate the dependence of surface alkyl chain order on the surfactant concentration in the precursor solution. The degree of order for the SWCNT-bound SDS molecules, is probed by vibrational sum frequency generation (VSFG) spectroscopy. We find concrete evidence for the presence of highly ordered surface structures at sufficiently high SDS concentrations, attributed here to cylindrical-like micelle assemblies with the SWCNT at the core. As the SDS concentration decreases, the interfacial order is found to decrease as well, generating a more disordered or random adsorption of surfactants on the nanotube surfaces.