Rational design criteria for small molecule amphiphiles that reliably form technologically useful, triply periodic, multiply continuous aqueous lyotropic liquid crystals are not well-established. Since these network phases (e.g., bicontinuous cubic gyroid and diamond morphologies) typically exhibit interfaces that significantly deviate from constant mean curvature, traditional single-tail surfactants only form these structures over small amphiphile concentration and temperature phase windows. We recently demonstrated the unusual propensity for anionic dicarboxylate gemini surfactants to form bicontinuous cubic lyotropic phases (Q-phases) over large amphiphile concentration windows up to 20 wt% wide between 25-100 �C. In the context of these studies, we describe the discovery and identification of a new triply, periodic multiply continuous, lyotropic network phase with non-cubic symmetry.

Triply periodic, multiply continuous lyotropic liquid crystals derived from gemini dicarboxylate amphiphiles

245th National Meeting (2013)

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