Polymer-Confinement-Induced Nematic Transition of Microemulsion Droplets

Abstract

The soft matter such as polymers, surfactants, and colloidal particles forms a variety ofordered structures as a result of a delicate balance of energetic interactions and entropicinteractions originated from the large internal degree of freedom. Recently complexsystems consisting of surfactant and polymer acquire great interests because they playimportant roles in the field of biology, medicine, cosmetic, and food industry. In thisreview we introduce recent researches on the complex systems from the soft matterphysics point of view. We deal with the case, which polymers are confined in thespherical microemulsion droplet in water/surfactant/oil ternary systems. Themicroemulsion and polymer systems, the confined polymers induce unique multi-stagemorphology transitions as a result of a delicate balance of confining entropy of polymerchain and elastic energy of surfactant membrane. We believe that the surfactant membrane and polymer complex systems involve quite fruitful soft matter physics, which is useful to understand a variety of biological and industrial phenomena.