Efficiency Boosting in Technical Grade Sugar Surfactant Based Microemulsions Using Pluronics

Abstract

Abstract The high amount of surfactant needed to formulate a bicontinuous microemulsion is a limiting factor for industrial usage of these systems. Commercially available triblock copolymers can be obtained in high amounts. Here, we show the influence of size and composition of different poly(ethyleneoxide)-poly(propyleneoxide)-poly(ethyleneoxide) triblock copolymer surfactants (Pluronics) on a technical grade sugar surfactant microemulsion. The so-called efficiency boosting can also be realized in such technical grade systems. The resulting efficiency boosting is studied systematically with regard to the impact of the polymer size and the composition of the system.