Phase separation in solution of worm-like micelles: a dilute spin-vector model
Pascal Panizza; Galder Cristobal; Jacques Curély; Pascal Panizza; Centre de Physique Moléculaire Optique et Hertzienne, U.M.R. 5798, Université Bordeaux I 351, Cours de la Libération, 33405 Talence Cedex, France; Galder Cristobal; Centre de Physique Moléculaire Optique et Hertzienne, U.M.R. 5798, Université Bordeaux I 351, Cours de la Libération, 33405 Talence Cedex, France; Jacques Curély; Centre de Physique Moléculaire Optique et Hertzienne, U.M.R. 5798, Université Bordeaux I 351, Cours de la Libération, 33405 Talence Cedex, France
Журнал:
Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter
Дата:
1998-12-21
Аннотация:
We show how the dilute spin vector model introduced originally by Wheeler and co-workers for describing the polymerization phenomenon in solutions of liquid sulphur and of living polymers may be conveniently adapted for studying phase separation in systems containing long flexible micelles. We draw an isomorphism between the coupling constant appearing in the exchange Hamiltonian and the surfactant energies in the micellar problem. We solve this problem within the mean-field approximation and compare the main results we have obtained with respect to polymer theory and previous theories of phase separation in micellar solutions. We show that the attractive interaction term between monomers renormalizes the aggregation energy and subsequently the corresponding size distribution. Under these conditions, we observe that the general aspect of the phase diagram in the plane (where is the surfactant concentration) is different from previous results. The spinodal line shows a re-entrant behaviour and, at low concentrations, we point out the possibility of specific nucleation phenomena related to the existence of a metastable transition line between a region composed of spherical micelles and another one corresponding to a dilute solution of long flexible micelles.
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