Density functional theory for the microscopic structure of nanoparticles at the liquid-liquid interface

We propose an extension of the density functional approach to study the structure and thermodynamic properties of a system comprising a certain amount of nanoparticles at the interface between two partially miscible liquids. Model calculations have been carried out for a binary symmetric mixture of Yukawa fluids and hard-sphere nanoparticles. Despite its simplicity, the model captures the principal features of this type of system. The results indicate that nanoparticles form layers and the number of layers depends on the amount of nanoparticles and on their diameters. For the systems studied the formation of the layers evidences strong localization of the nanoparticles at the interface.