1. In situ spectroscopic studies of the behavior of polyelectrolyte/surfactant mixtures at the water/TiO2 interface using attenuated total internal reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) and multivariate least squares data analysis.
Dr. Dion Rivera Department of Chemistry, Central Washington University, Ellensburg, WA
Below are results of multivariate analysis of UV-Vis spectroscopic data showing the
concentrations of three species in solution as surfactant is added to the solution. The
cartoon in the captions below indicates the point at which the polyelectrolyte /surfactant
complex is no longer in solution. These solution phase results agree with our ATR-FTIR
results that show the polyelectrolyte/surfactant complexes interacting with the TiO2 at similar
mol ratios of polyelectrolyte to surfactant. Future work will involve understanding the behavior
of the polyelectrolyte/surfactant complex at elevated temperature using both ATR-FTIR and UV-Vis.
Cartoon of polyelectrolyte,
surfactant, and dye in solution
TiO2
TiO2
TiO2
Dye
Polyelectrolyte
Surfactant