Forces between surfactant-coated ZnS nanoparticles in dodecane: Effect of water Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • AbstractThe forces between mica surfaces confining solutions of spherical and rodshaped ZnS nanoparticles (diameter ca. 5nm) coated with hexadecylamine or octadecylamine surfactant in dodecane have been measured in the absence and after the introduction of trace amounts of water. Initially, or at very low water content, the water molecules cause the nanoparticles to aggregate and adsorb on the hydrophilic mica surfaces, resulting in a longrange exponentially decaying repulsive force between the surfaces. After longer times (>20h), water bridges nucleate and grow between the nanoparticles and mica surfaces, and attractive capillary forces then cause a longrange attraction and a strong (shortrange) adhesion. It is found, as has previously been observed in nonaqueous bulk colloidal systems, that even trace amounts of water have a profound effect on the interactions and structure of nanoparticle assemblies in thin films, which in turn affect their physical properties. These effects should be considered in the design of thinfilm processing methodologies.

published proceedings

  • ADVANCED FUNCTIONAL MATERIALS

altmetric score

  • 3

author list (cited authors)

  • Alig, A., Akbulut, M., Golan, Y., & Israelachvili, J.

citation count

  • 36

complete list of authors

  • Alig, Anna R Godfrey||Akbulut, Mustafa||Golan, Yuval||Israelachvili, Jacob

publication date

  • October 2006

publisher