Synthesis and Characterization of a Novel Short Fluorocarbon Chain Cationic Surfactant

A novel short fluorocarbon chain cationic surfactant has been synthesized to reduce the bioaccumulation of traditional fluorocarbon surfactants and maintain excellent surface properties simultaneously. The structure, surface activity, and micelle formation of surfactants have been investigated by surface tension, conductivity, dynamic light scattering, steady-state fluorescence, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and Nuclear magnetic resonance. The novel surfactant (yield more than 81%) exhibited good surface activity, the critical micelle concentration and surface tension were below 2.35 mmol L^?1 and 20.54 mN m^?1 in the range of temperature from 288 to 303 K, respectively. The surface tension decreased to 17.45 mN m^?1 with an increase in temperature. The thermodynamic parameters (, and ) of micellization for surfactants were evaluated, which implying the micellization process was contributed primarily by the entropy driving. In addition, the aggregation behavior of surfactants was also studied in detail, which demonstrated a small micelle aggregation number of 9.40 and large size distribution of 164–342 nm.