Hydrophobic effect, micelle formation

Along with the hydrophobic effect, micelle formation is further guided by the volume ratio of the hydrophobic and hydrophilic polymer domains. Through these principles, it is possible to synthetically engineer soft matter to organize into various nanoscale morphologies that can be precisely tuned as a result of the chemical control provided by, in this particular discussion, a well-defined ROMP catalyst [22,26]. 

Tanford, C., The Hydrophobic Effect. The Formation of Micelles and Biological Membranes, 2d ed., Wiley, New York, 1980. (Undergraduate level. A classic reference by a pioneer on the hydrophobic effect on the relevance of surfactants to biological membranes.)... 

Tanford, C. The Hydrophobic Effect, The Formation of Micelles and Biological Membranes, 2nd ed., Wiley New York, 1980. 

Studies described in earlier chapters used cellular automata dynamics to model the hydrophobic effect and other solution phenomena such as dissolution, diffusion, micelle formation, and immiscible solvent demixing. In this section we describe several cellular automata models of the influence of the hydropathic state of a surface on water and on solute concentration in an aqueous solution. We first examine the effect of the surface hydropathic state on the accumulation of water near the surface. A second example models the effect of surface hydropathic state on the rate and accumulation of water flowing through a tube. A final example shows the effect of the surface on the concentration of solute molecules within an aqueous solution. 

Tanford C. The hydrophobic effect formation of micelles and biological membranes. New York John Wiley Sons, 1980. 

Although the notion of monomolecular surface layers is of fundamental importance to all phases of surface science, surfactant monolayers at the aqueous surface are so unique as virtually to constitute a special state of matter. For the many types of amphipathic molecules that meet the simple requirements for monolayer formation it is possible, using quite simple but elegant techniques over a century old, to obtain quantitative information on intermolecular forces and, furthermore, to manipulate them at will. The special driving force for self-assembly of surfactant molecules as monolayers, micelles, vesicles, or cell membranes (Fendler, 1982) when brought into contact with water is the hydrophobic effect. 

This may be caused by two factors. First of all, in the case of pyridinium salts there may be a contribution from the hydrophobic interactions between neighbouring bound headgroups (an effect which would not contribute to the free energy of micelle formation). Secondly, a steric hindrance effect may prevent the positive chrge on the trlmethylammonium head group from approaching close to the polylon charge. 

Surfactant aggregation in an anhydrous, nonpolar medium differs in several important respects from aggregation in water. The most apparent of these differences is that the hydrophobic effect plays no role in the formation of reverse micelles. The amphipathic species are relatively passive in aqueous micellization, being squeezed out of solution by the water. In contrast, surfactant molecules play an active role in the formation of reverse micelles, which are held together by specific interactions between head groups in the micellar core. 

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