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Studying Surfactant Effects on Hydrate Crystallization at Oil-Water Interfaces Using a Low-Cost Integrated Modular Peltier Device
Published on: March 18, 2020
Evaporation-Induced Crystallization of Surfactants in Sessile Multicomponent Droplets
Yaxing Li1, Valentin Salvator1, Herman Wijshoff2,3
1Physics of Fluids Group, Department of Science and Technology, Mesa+ Institute for Nanotechnology, Max Planck Center for Complex Fluid Dynamics and J. M. Burgers Centre for Fluid Dynamics, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7500 AE Enschede, The Netherlands.
Abstract:
Surfactants have been widely studied and used in controlling droplet evaporation. In this work, we observe and study the crystallization of sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) within an evaporating glycerol-water mixture droplet. The crystallization is induced by the preferential evaporation of water, which decreases the solubility of SDS in the mixture. As a consequence, the crystals shield the droplet surface and cease the evaporation. The universality of the evaporation characteristics for a range of droplet sizes is revealed by applying a diffusion model, extended by Raoult's law. To describe the nucleation and growth of the crystals, we employ the 2-dimensional crystallization model of Weinberg [J. Non-Cryst. Solids 1991, 134, 116]. The results of this model compare favorably to our experimental results. Our findings may inspire the community to reconsider the role of high concentration of surfactants in a multicomponent evaporation system.
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