Self-assembly of Surfactants at the Solid-Aqueous Interface

Just would like to comment on how much easier it is to read new material that uses concepts that you are more familiar with.  I say this after reading a paper (Self Assembly of Surfactants at the Solid-aqueous interface; Tiberg, F.; Curr. Opinion in Coll. & Inter. Sci., 2000, 4, 411-419) where the author uses AFM to image the morphology of surfactants adsorbed to substrates.  After training on using AFM I have found that I understand what is being discussed much easier because I'm not unclear about the method being used to produce the images.  Also, on pg 415 there was something I found interesting and wondered if it was worth looking into in my current project,

 "The presence of highly polarisable on-ion such as caesium, induces smaller surface aggregates than the less polarisable potassium co-ion.  Highly polarisable co-ions interact with the mica surface more strongly and therefore compete more effectively with the surfactant for adsorption sites.  The main effect of counter-ions present at the solid surfactant interface is to decrease the repulsionbetween the surfactant head groups , as in bulk solution.  In summary, the effect of added salt is the result of a complex balance, which can give rise to an increase or decrease in aggregate curvature, or merely less ordered aggregate forms."

What I find intriguing is that with a reduced area of adsorption, at least the area that we are interested in, i.e. our "terraces", what kind of morphology would be seen in the presence of salts added to decrease the repulsive forces between the head groups?  Something I also find interesting is in the case where "troughs" are present, what will we see happen when salts that compete with the surfactant for binding space are present?

A note for the future, same page as before, try tetradecyl trimethyl ammonium bromide (ionic on hydrophilic surface) on silica to look for spherical micelles, see if they are the same in the case of different wall chemistry.