Above: Sam Shortall and Professor Shawn Wettig in the lab. The Wettig lab collaborated with researchers at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia on the featured article
This February, an article that examined fundamental qualities of a mixed surfactant system was highlighted as a Hot Article in the prestigious Royal Society of Chemistry Advances journal. The article was co-authored by members of the Wettig lab led by Prof. Shawn Wettig at the University of Waterloo School of Pharmacy and Gerrard Marangoni and his team at the St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia.
Surfactants are substances that affect the surface tensions of liquids in which they are dissolved. They are used in drug development and the manufacturing of many commercial products like detergents, plastics, and cosmetics.
In the featured paper, the Wettig and Marangoni labs collaborated to assess the behavior of a unique mixed surfactant substance and to determine how it behaved at a molecular level. Surfactant mixtures can be made by combining or tweaking off-the-shelf surfactant products or by designing novel systems entirely. The Wettig lab specializes in studying and optimizing the behavior of surfactant systems so that they can be used in drug and gene delivery.
It’s essential that we understand how mixed surfactant systems operate on a molecular level. This knowledge allows us to make educated design decisions so that we end up with the most effective surfactants possible.
When mixing multiple surfactants, their properties can also change. Thus, any time new substances are combined to form unique mixed surfactant systems, researchers must conduct additional studies to understand how the system functions.
"Surfactant systems consisting of two or more surfactants in solution can introduce new properties that would not be possible for either component on its own,” says co-author Samantha Shortall, a PhD candidate in the Wettig group. “It essentially provides an opportunity to optimize the surfactant performance in a particular application."
The Maragoni and Wettig labs both study surfactants and often collaborate on fundamental surfactant research. The featured article, m-s-m cationic gemini and zwitterionic surfactants – a thermodynamic analysis of their mixed micelle formation, can be viewed online.