Charged unilamellar vesicles in a concentrated suspension can deflate and transition to a bilamellar state. We propose that the driving force for this deflation-induced transition is the repulsive electrostatic pressure between the charged vesicles. To directly examine the role of concentration and electrostatics on this transition, we study the time evolution of cationic vesicle suspensions at different surfactant and salt concentrations using CryoTEM imaging. We find that above a critical concentration, charged vesicles in a suspension can experience 'crowding' due to overlap of their electrical double layers that can result in a microstructural transformation, depending upon the salt concentration and vesicle size.

Microstructural transformations in concentrated, charged vesicle suspensions: The crowding hypothesis

243rd National Meeting (2012)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.