• Isa, Lucio
• Zaccarelli, Emanuela
• Camerin, Fabrizio
• Rovigatti, Lorenzo
• Fernández-Rodríguez, Miguel Ángel
• Ninarello, Andrea
• Gnan, Nicoletta
• Antonopoulou, Maria-Nefeli

Abstract

<p>Soft particles display highly versatile properties with respect to hard colloids and even more so at fluid-fluid interfaces. In particular, microgels, consisting of a cross-linked polymer network, are able to deform and flatten upon adsorption at the interface due to the balance between surface tension and internal elasticity. Despite the existence of experimental results, a detailed theoretical understanding of this phenomenon is still lacking due to the absence of appropriate microscopic models. In this work, we propose an advanced modeling of microgels at a flat water/oil interface. The model builds on a realistic description of the internal polymeric architecture and single-particle properties of the microgel and is able to reproduce its experimentally observed shape at the interface. Complementing molecular dynamics simulations with in situ cryo-electron microscopy experiments and atomic force microscopy imaging after Langmuir-Blodgett deposition, we compare the morphology of the microgels for different values of the cross-linking ratios. Our model allows for a systematic microscopic investigation of soft particles at fluid interfaces, which is essential to develop predictive power for the use of microgels in a broad range of applications, including the stabilization of smart emulsions and the versatile patterning of surfaces.</p>

Topics

• Deposition
• impedance spectroscopy
• morphology
• surface
• polymer
• experiment
• simulation
• atomic force microscopy
• molecular dynamics
• elasticity
• electron microscopy