Synthesis of an unconventional cationic surfactant precursor

The present research is about the development of a precursor of unconventional cationic surfactant by using the standard procedures of the Williamson ether synthesis. It has been intended to design a new type of heterogemini surfactant with a rigid spacer and non identical head groups in the structure of the surfactant. In the synthesis suggested, the preliminary step to obtain a surfactant structure with two aromatic rings as rigid spacer has been established. This synthesized precursor provides with a rigid spacer to the structure of the surfactant due to the presence of a biphenyl group; it is expected that, with this surfactant, it further presents a reduction on both the curvature of micellar aggregates as well as the Critical Micelle Concentration (CMC) in respect of those previous reports where conventional surfactants are used. To establish the steps of the synthesis, the temperature during the time of reaction has been varied, as well as the velocity of addition of the compound containing the head group which is pretended to be added to the surfactant structure proposed. For the characterization, the infrared spectroscopy technique (FT-IR) and the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) were used.