20 Soft and Biological Structures
20.1 Introduction: Equilibrium Considerations of Fluid Amphiphilic Structures
Amphiphilic molecules such as surfactants, lipids, copolymers, and proteins can associate into a variety of structures in aqueous solutions that can transform from one to another when the solution conditions are changed—for example, the ionic strength, type of ions in the solution, the pH, or temperature. To understand these structural aspects one requires an understanding not only the thermodynamics of self-assembly (discussed in Chapter 19) but also the forces between the amphiphilic molecules within the aggregates and how these are affected by the solution conditions. These two factors (thermodynamics and intraaggregate forces), ...
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