Investigation on Physical Properties and Morphologies of Microemulsions formed with Sodium Dodecyl Benzenesulfonate, Isobutanol, Brine, and Decane, Using Several Experimental Techniques

In the context of chemical enhanced oil recovery (EOR), there is no well-established way to characterize and understand the physical properties and structures of microemulsions composed of crude oil and industrial surfactants due to their complexity. Making a comparison to a well-studied model system is a simple and effective way to investigate the complex microemulsions. The purpose of this study is to provide and complete experimental characteristic data of model-microemulsions as a basis of analysis of the complex system. Types of microemulsions studied in the present work were oil in water (O/W), bicontinuous, and water in oil (W/O). The system was composed of water, sodium dodecyl benzenesulfonate (SDBS), isobutanol, sodium chloride (NaCl), and decane. We performed several experiments at room temperature such as spinning drop method, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), Karl Fischer titration, Hyamine titration, dynamic light scattering (DLS), small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS), and electron cry...