Issue 18, 2012
From the journal:

Soft Matter

SynchrotronXRR study of soft nanofilms at the mica–water interface

Wuge H. Briscoe,*a   Francesca Speranza,a   Peixun Li,b   Oleg Konovalov,c   Laurence Bouchenoire,de   Jan van Stam,f   Jacob Klein,g   Robert M. J. Jacobsh  and  Robert K. Thomasb  

* Corresponding authors

a School of Chemistry, University of Bristol, Cantock's Close, Bristol BS8 1TS, United Kingdom
E-mail: wuge.briscoe@bris.ac.uk
Fax: +44 (0)117 925 1295
Tel: +44 (0)117 3318256

b Physical and Theoretical Chemistry Laboratory, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3QZ, United Kingdom

c ID10B, European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF), 6 Rue Jules Horowitz, BP 220, 38043 Grenoble CEDEX 9, France

d XMaS, the UK-CRG, European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF), 6 Rue Jules Horowitz, BP 220, 38043 Grenoble CEDEX 9, France

e Department of Physics, Oliver Lodge Laboratory, University of Liverpool, Oxford Street, Liverpool L69 7ZE, United Kingdom

f Department of Chemistry and Biomedical Sciences, Karlstad University, SE-651 88 Karlstad, Sweden

g Department of Materials and Interfaces, Weizmann Institute of Science, 76100 Rehovot, Israel

h Department of Chemistry, Chemistry Research Laboratory, University of Oxford, Mansfield Road, Oxford OX1 3TA, United Kingdom

Abstract

We describe here the design of a liquid cell specific for synchrotron X-ray reflectometry (XRR) characterisation of soft matter nanofilms at the mica–water interface. The feature of the cell is a “bending mica” method: by slightly bending the mica substrate over an underling cylinder the rigidity of the mica sheet along the bending axis is enhanced, providing sufficient flatness along the apex of the cylinder as required by XRR measurements. Using this cell, we have performed XRR measurements for a number of systems and in this article we show example results: (1) a cationic surfactant, C16TAB; (2) a zwitterionic surfactant, C12H25PC; (3) a semi-fluorinated surfactant, F4H11(d)TAB; and (4) surface complex of an anionic fluorinated surfactant, CsPFN, and a positively charged polymer, PEI. For the data analysis we have taken into account the mica crystal truncation rod, i.e. the reflectivity from the mica substrate, and fitted the data with a custom Java™ based software package. Our results unravel detailed structural information of these soft nanofilms, indicating that this method is suitable for XRR measurements of a wide range of soft matter structures at the mica–water interface.

Graphical abstract: Synchrotron XRR study of soft nanofilms at the mica–water interface

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Article information

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1039/C2SM07179G
Article type
Paper
Submitted
15 Nov 2011
Accepted
05 Mar 2012
First published
23 Mar 2012

Soft Matter, 2012,8, 5055-5068

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Synchrotron XRR study of soft nanofilms at the mica–water interface

W. H. Briscoe, F. Speranza, P. Li, O. Konovalov, L. Bouchenoire, J. van Stam, J. Klein, R. M. J. Jacobs and R. K. Thomas, Soft Matter, 2012, 8, 5055 DOI: 10.1039/C2SM07179G

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