Studying the Effect of n-Hexane on the Formation of P123 Micelles in the Mesostructured Sol of Titania by DLS Technique

In this research، stable mesostructured titania sols were synthesized employing P123 block copolymer as soft template under controlled hydrolysis of titanium isopropoxide (TTIP) in alcoholic media. In order to study the effect of Hexane additive on the sol characteristics and aggregation of the P123 unimers، two molar ratios of Hexane to P123 (H/P) of 60 and 240 were used in the sol composition. The effect of addition stage of Hexane to the sol and aging time (at 50 ˚Cfor 1 and 14 days) on the size distribution of unimeric clusters were also investigated by dynamic light scattering (DLS) technique. It was shown that the stage of addition has a marked effect on the size distribution of the clusters formed. Comparison ofDLS plots for the prepared sols with and without Hexane revealed a shift towards smaller sizes for the former. Further، no signs of micelle formation could be detected for the sample containing the highest Hexane content، based on DLS results. However، for the sample with H/P molar ratio of 60 aged for 1 and 14 days،rising sizes of the clusters close to P123 micelle size was noticed. This reached to 19 nm for the sample with 60 H/Pmolar ratio aged for 14 days. Finally، micelle formation and micellar aggregation will be discussed for the system studied here.