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+38 (067) 55-999-07 Surfactants: what is it and what surfactants are
The production of surfactants is growing every year. By 2020, the global market for surfactants has increased compared to 2016, and amounted to almost 36 billion dollars. More and more industrial enterprises use surfactants in their production as raw materials.
The largest users of surfactants include:
- Chemical industry (including production of household chemicals)
- Oil industry
- Textile industry
- Agriculture
- Production of construction chemicals and materials
- Cosmetics and more
What is Surfactant
Surfactants are substances with an asymmetric molecular structure. Namely, their molecules have one part that interacts well with water (hydrophilic) and the second part – hydrophobic, which is afraid of water. Accordingly, if a given asymmetric surfactant molecule enters an aqueous medium with oil drops, then one part of it remains in the water, while the other part tends to leave it into the oil or into the air. Thus, the molecule remains at the interface between oil and water, and the emulsifying function of the surfactant is manifested. Namely, the ability to mix immiscible media, such as water and oil.
What are Surfactants
There are several types of surfactants substances:
- Nonionic
- Anionic
- Cationic surfactants │ Ionic surfactants
- Amphoteric
Picture 1.
Figure 1 shows the molecular structure of each type of surfactant. Let’s describe each of them in a little more detail.
Nonionic surfactants
Nonionic surfactants are surfactants whose molecule does not form any ions in an aqueous solution. The main representatives of nonionic surfactants:
- polyhydric alcohols
- polyethylene glycols
- high dissociation RCOOH acids
- amines
- alkyl glycosides
- ethoxysilates, propoxylates and butoxylates
- neon
- syntanol.
Ionic surfactants: anionic, cationic and amphoteric
1. Anionic surfactants are called, which in the process of ionization in an aqueous solution form negatively charged organic ions. This is the reason for the properties of the surfactant.
Anionic surfactants include: salts of carboxylic and sulfonic acids, salts of thiosulfates and persulfates, salts of sulfoesters and sulfamic acids.
2. Cationic – these surfactants in the process of ionization in aqueous solutions form positively charged organic ions, which determine their properties.
Prominent representatives of cationic surfactants: amine salts, quaternary amine oxides, ammonium bases and their salts, salts of phosphonium bases and themselves, etc.
3. Amphoteric surfactants – substances that, in the process of ionization in an aqueous solution, can form both negatively and positively charged organic ions, depending on environmental conditions ( pH, additional additives, etc.)
The group of amphoteric surfactants includes: carboxybetaines, sulfobetaines, phosphobetaines, aminocarboxylic acids, salts of aminocarboxylic acids.
The main raw materials for the production of surfactants are higher fatty alcohols.