Anionic surfactants sulfates

The surfactants used in the emulsion polymerization of acryhc monomers are classified as anionic, cationic, or nonionic. Anionic surfactants, such as salts of alkyl sulfates and alkylarene sulfates and phosphates, or nonionic surfactants, such as alkyl or aryl polyoxyethylenes, are most common (87,98—101). Mixed anionic—nonionic surfactant systems are also widely utilized (102—105). 

A.lkyl Sulfosuccinate Half Asters. These detergents are prepared by reaction of maleic anhydride and a primary fatty alcohol, followed by sulfonation with sodium bisulfite. A typical member of this group is disodium lauryl sulfosucciaate [26838-05-1]. Although not known as effective foamers, these surfactants can boost foams and act as stabilizers when used ia combination with other anionic surfactants. In combination with alkyl sulfates, they are said to reduce the irritation effects of the latter (6). 

Three generations of latices as characterized by the type of surfactant used in manufacture have been defined (53). The first generation includes latices made with conventional (/) anionic surfactants like fatty acid soaps, alkyl carboxylates, alkyl sulfates, and alkyl sulfonates (54) (2) nonionic surfactants like poly(ethylene oxide) or poly(vinyl alcohol) used to improve freeze—thaw and shear stabiUty and (J) cationic surfactants like amines, nitriles, and other nitrogen bases, rarely used because of incompatibiUty problems. Portiand cement latex modifiers are one example where cationic surfactants are used. Anionic surfactants yield smaller particles than nonionic surfactants (55). Often a combination of anionic surfactants or anionic and nonionic surfactants are used to provide improved stabiUty. The stabilizing abiUty of anionic fatty acid soaps diminishes at lower pH as the soaps revert to their acids. First-generation latices also suffer from the presence of soap on the polymer particles at the end of the polymerization. Steam and vacuum stripping methods are often used to remove the soap and unreacted monomer from the final product (56). 

Lignites and lignosulfonates can act as o/w emulsifiers, but generally are added for other purposes. Various anionic surfactants, including alkylarylsulfonates and alkylaryl sulfates and poly(ethylene oxide) derivatives of fatty acids, esters, and others, are used. Very Httle oil is added to water-base muds in use offshore for environmental reasons. A nonionic poly(ethylene oxide) derivative of nonylphenol [9016-45-9] is used in calcium-treated muds (126). 

Anionic surfactants are the most commonly used class of surfactant. Anionic surfactants include sulfates such as sodium alkylsulfate and the homologous ethoxylated versions and sulfonates, eg, sodium alkylglycerol ether sulfonate and sodium cocoyl isethionate. Nonionic surfactants are commonly used at low levels ( 1 2%) to reduce soap scum formation of the product, especially in hard water. These nonionic surfactants are usually ethoxylated fatty materials, such as H0CH2CH20(CH2CH20) R. These are commonly based on triglycerides or fatty alcohols. Amphoteric surfactants, such as cocamidopropyl betaine and cocoamphoacetate, are more recent surfactants in the bar soap area and are typically used at low levels (<2%) as secondary surfactants. These materials can have a dramatic impact on both the lathering and mildness of products (26). 

Carboxylate, sulfonate, sulfate, and phosphate ate the polar, solubilizing groups found in most anionic surfactants. In dilute solutions of soft water, these groups ate combined with a 12—15 carbon chain hydrophobe for best surfactant properties. In neutral or acidic media, or in the presence of heavy-metal salts, eg, Ca, the carboxylate group loses most of its solubilizing power. 

Ammonium lauryl sulfate is an anionic surfactant. This means it lowers the surface tension of water, making the water spread more easily. Surfactants are also called wetting agents—in plain terms, they make water wetter. 

Further auxiliary agents for the production of anionic surfactants are the sulfation and sulfonation agents oleum, chlorosulfonic acid, C1-S02-0H, air-S03 mixtures, air-S02 mixtures, sultones (especially 1,3-propanesultone (CH2—CH2—CH2—SO2), and isethionic acid (2-hydroxyethanesulfonic O-------------------1... 

Higher molecular primary unbranched or low-branched alcohols are used not only for the synthesis of nonionic but also of anionic surfactants, like fatty alcohol sulfates or ether sulfates. These alcohols are produced by catalytic high-pressure hydrogenation of the methyl esters of fatty acids, obtained by a transesterification reaction of fats or fatty oils with methanol or by different procedures, like hydroformylation or the Alfol process, starting from petroleum chemical raw materials. 

Ethylene oxide is an important intermediate chemical not only for the production of nonionic surfactants like fatty alcohol ethoxylates, alkylphenol ethoxy lates, or propylene oxide/ethylene oxide block copolymers, but also for manufacturing of anionic surfactants like alcohol ether sulfates. 

As esters of sulfuric acid, the hydrophilic group of alcohol sulfates and alcohol ether sulfates is the sulfate ion, which is linked to the hydrophobic tail through a C-O-S bond. This bond gives the molecule a relative instability as this linkage is prone to hydrolysis in acidic media. This establishes a basic difference from other key anionic surfactants such as alkyl and alkylbenzene-sulfonates, which have a C-S bond, completely stable in all normal conditions of use. The chemical structure of these sulfate molecules partially limits their conditions of use and their application areas but nevertheless they are found undoubtedly in the widest range of application types among anionic surfactants. 

Sodium dodecylbenzenesulfonate is undoubtedly the anionic surfactant used in the greatest amount because it is the basic component in almost all laundry and dishwashing detergents in powder and liquid forms. However, alcohol and alcohol ether sulfates are the more versatile anionic surfactants because their properties vary, with the alkyl chain, with the number of moles of ethylene oxide added to the base alcohol and with the cation. Consequently, alcohol and alcohol ether sulfates are used in almost all scientific, consumer, and industrial applications. 

Other detection methods are based on optical transmittance [228-231], Alcohol sulfates have been determined by spectrophotometric titration with barium chloride in aqueous acetone at pH 3 and an indicator [232] or by titration with Septonex (carbethoxypentadecyltrimethylammonium bromide) and neutral red as indicator at pH 8.2-8.4 and 540 nm [233]. In a modified two-phase back-titration method, the anionic surfactant solution is treated with hyamine solution, methylene blue, and chloroform and then titrated with standard sodium dodecyl sulfate. The chloroform passing through a porous PTFE membrane is circulated through a spectrometer and the surfactant is analyzed by determining the absorbance at 655 nm [234]. The use of a stirred titration vessel combined with spectrophotometric measurement has also been suggested [235]. Alternative endpoint detections are based on physical methods, such as stalag-mometry [236] and nonfaradaic potentiometry [237]. 

Turbidimetric titration has also been applied to one-phase titration of alcohol sulfates and other anionic surfactants. The titration is carried out with hyamine 1622 in aqueous solution without the organic phase and indicator and the endpoint is taken as the point of maximum turbidity. The presence of nonionics and inorganic salts at high concentration interfere with the endpoint determination [243]. 

Electrochemical analytical techniques are a class of titration methods which in turn can be subdivided into potentiometric titrations using ion-selective electrodes and polarographic methods. Polarographic methods are based on the suppression of the overpotential associated with oxygen or other species in the polarographic cell caused by surfactants or on the effect of surfactants on the capacitance of the electrode. One example of this latter case is the method based on the interference of anionic surfactants with cationic surfactants, or vice versa, on the capacitance of a mercury drop electrode. This interference can be used in the one-phase titration of sulfates without indicator to determine the endpoint... 

Solutions with low content of alcohol and alcohol ether sulfates cannot be analyzed by the two-phase method and specialized procedures have been developed. ISO method 7875/1 [267] is the standard method for analyzing sulfates and other anionic surfactants at very low concentrations, such as in waste-waters. The absorbance of the chloroform layer containing the surfactant-dye complex is spectrometrically measured at 650 nm and quantified using a calibration curve. Different improvements of this method have been developed [268,269]. 

Similarly to quantitative determination of high surfactant concentrations, many alternative methods have been proposed for the quantitative determination of low surfactant concentrations. Tsuji et al. [270] developed a potentio-metric method for the microdetermination of anionic surfactants that was applied to the analysis of 5-100 ppm of sodium dodecyl sulfate and 1-10 ppm of sodium dodecyl ether (2.9 EO) sulfate. This method is based on the inhibitory effect of anionic surfactants on the enzyme system cholinesterase-butyryl-thiocholine iodide. A constant current is applied across two platinum plate electrodes immersed in a solution containing butyrylthiocholine and surfactant. Since cholinesterase produces enzymatic hydrolysis of the substrate, the decrease in the initial velocity of the hydrolysis caused by the surfactant corresponds to its concentration. Amounts up to 60 pg of alcohol sulfate can be spectrometrically determined with acridine orange by extraction of the ion pair with a mixture 3 1 (v/v) of benzene/methyl isobutyl ketone [271]. 

A highly sensitive method for the determination of anionic surfactants, particularly sodium dodecyl sulfate, has been described [275]. The method is based on the formation of fluorescent ionic complexes of the anionic surfactant with acridine red and acridine yellow. The complexes are extracted with dichloro-... 

Thin-layer chromatography (TLC) is used both for characterization of alcohol sulfates and alcohol ether sulfates and for their analysis in mixtures. This technique, combined with the use of scanning densitometers, is a quantitative analytical method. TLC is preferred to HPLC in this case as anionic surfactants do not contain strong chromophores and the refractive index detector is of low sensitivity and not suitable for gradient elution. A recent development in HPLC detector technology, the evaporative light-scattering detector, will probably overcome these sensitivity problems. 

The ion pair extraction by flow injection analysis (FIA) has been used to analyze sodium dodecyl sulfate and sodium dodecyl ether (3 EO) sulfate among other anionic surfactants. The solvating agent was methanol and the phase-separating system was designed with a PTFE porous membrane permeable to chloroform but impermeable to the aqueous solution. The method is applicable to concentrations up to 1.25 mM with a detection limit of 15 pM [304]. 

Linear primary alcohol sulfates often need only one day for 95 % primary biodegradation and degrade faster than other anionic surfactants, which usually need several days. This difference has been confirmed by Ruschenberg [412, 413]. 

In an extensive study by Read et al. [93], 10 anionic surfactants were evaluated for their ability to remove pyritic sulfur and ash from ultrafine Illinois no. 5 coal by flotation processes. The authors observed that of the commercially available surfactants, sodium dodecyl sulfate was the most effective on either a weight or a molar basis, followed by a linear AOS (average molweight 272) and alkylpolyethoxylated sulfonates. Of the noncommercial surfactants tested, -(E -b-dodecene-b-suIfonate (f0) was the most effective and better than any commercial surfactant on a dosage/recovery basis. 

The amount of residual sulfonate ester remaining after hydrolysis can be determined by a procedure proposed by Martinsson and Nilsson [129], similar to that used to determine total residual saponifiables in neutral oils. Neutrals, including alkanes, alkenes, secondary alcohols, and sultones, as well as the sulfonate esters in the AOS, are isolated by extraction from an aqueous alcoholic solution with petroleum ether. The sulfonate esters are separated from the sultones by chromatography on a silica gel column. Each eluent fraction is subjected to saponification and measured as active matter by MBAS determination measuring the extinction of the trichloromethane solution at 642 nra. (a) Sultones. Connor et al. [130] first reported, in 1975, a very small amount of skin sensitizer, l-unsaturated-l,3-sultone, and 2-chloroalkane-l,3-sultone in the anionic surfactant produced by the sulfation of ethoxylated fatty alcohol. These compounds can also be found in some AOS products consequently, methods of detection are essential. 

Compared with the fatty alcohol sulfates, which are also oleochemically produced anionic surfactants, the ester sulfonates have the advantage that their raw materials are on a low and therefore cost-effective level of fat refinement. The ester sulfonates are produced directly from the fatty acid esters by sulfona-tion, whereas the fatty alcohols, which are the source materials of the fatty alcohol sulfates, have to be formed by the catalytic high-pressure hydrogenation of fatty acids esters [9]. The fatty acid esters are obtained directly from the fats and oils by transesterification of the triglycerides with alcohols [10]. 

One of the longest known synthetically prepared surfactants are the fatty alcohol sulfates, which were prepared on technical scale before 1940. Along with their ethoxylated counterparts, the fatty alcohol ether sulfates, which appeared on the stage shortly after, their use in toiletries is very popular but they can also be found in products for textile industry and auxiliaries in emulsion polymerization. With the exception of soaps, the mentioned anionic surfactants all have a sulfur-containing functional group. Denying the differences between these, their skin irritancy potential is remarkably high. 

Sulfosuccinates are not only less irritating to skin and mucus membranes than other surfactants, but it was also found that they reduce skin irritation of other surfactants used in skin and hair care products. In particular, the effect on sodium lauryl ether sulfate was found to be most pronounced [103]. Figure 14 shows the mollifying effect of disodium oleic acid monoethanol amide sulfo-succinate when blended with anionic surfactant at a total concentration of 15%. 

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