Nanostructures in n-Octanol Equilibrated with Additives and/or Water

Fluid fatty alcohols are believed to be nanostructured but broadly amorphous (i.e., noncrystalline) fluids and solvents, including the most popular fatty tissue mimetic, hydrated n-octanol (i.e., hydro-octanol). To check this premise, we studied dry octanol and hydro-octanol as a model of relatively...

Description complète

Détails bibliographiques
Publié dans:Langmuir : the ACS journal of surfaces and colloids. - 1985. - 34(2018), 21 vom: 29. Mai, Seite 6285-6295
Auteur principal: Cevc, Gregor (Auteur)
Autres auteurs: Berts, Ida, Fischer, Stefan F, Rädler, Joachim O, Nickel, Bert
Format: Article en ligne
Langue:English
Publié: 2018
Accès à la collection:Langmuir : the ACS journal of surfaces and colloids
Sujets:Journal Article Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Description
Résumé:Fluid fatty alcohols are believed to be nanostructured but broadly amorphous (i.e., noncrystalline) fluids and solvents, including the most popular fatty tissue mimetic, hydrated n-octanol (i.e., hydro-octanol). To check this premise, we studied dry octanol and hydro-octanol as a model of relatively short fluid n-alkanols with small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS). We also combined this alkanol with the matching alkane (i.e., octane) and with a common anti-inflammatory pain killer (ketoprofen). This revealed that (hydro-)octanol and arguably any other short fatty alcohol form a mesophase. Its basic structural motif are regularly packed polar nanoclusters, reflected in the inner peak in the SAXS diffractogram of (hydro-)octanol and other fluid n-alkanols. The nanoclusters arguably resemble tiny, (inverse) hydrated bilayer fragments, located on a thermally smeared para-crystalline lattice. Additives to hydro-octanol can change the nanoclusters only moderately, if at all. For example, octane and the drug ketoprofen added to hydro-octanol enlarge the nanoclusters only little because of the mixture's packing frustration. To associate with and to bring more water into hydro-octanol, an additive must hence transform the nanoclusters: it expands them into irregularly distributed aqueous lacunae that form a proto-microemulsion, reflected in the previously unknown Guinier's SAXS signal. A "weak" (i.e., a weakly polar or nonpolar) additive can moreover create only size-limited lacunae. Coexistence of nanoclusters and lacunae as well as size variability of the latter in hydro-octanol subvert the concept of octanol-water partition coefficient, which relies on the studied compartment homogeneity. In turn, it opens new possibilities for interfacial catalysis. Reinterpreting "octanol-water partition coefficient" data in terms of octanol-water association or binding constant(s) could furthermore diminish the variability of molecular lipophilicity description and pave the ground toward a more precise theoretical quantification and prediction of molecular properties
Description:Date Completed 10.09.2018
Date Revised 10.09.2018
published: Print-Electronic
Citation Status PubMed-not-MEDLINE
ISSN:1520-5827
DOI:10.1021/acs.langmuir.8b00142