Dissipative particle dynamics simulation of ionic liquid based microemulsion: quantitative properties and emulsification mechanism

In order to study the quantitative properties and the mechanism of the microemulsions, dissipative particle dynamics (DPD) simulation was utilized to investigate a system that was composed of glycerol trioleate, n-butanol, TX-100 and [Bmim][BF4]. The simulation results showed good consistency with the experimental data. Through the simulation, the effects of different factors including the amount of surfactant, co-surfactant and glycerol trioleate (GT) were investigated. The radial distribution function, the diffusion coefficient, and the order parameter of the GT were obtained to illustrate the mesoscopic properties of the system. More importantly, the interaction energies between different components were calculated to study the driving force of the micro-emulsification process. The DPD simulation was proved to be an efficient tool for analyzing complex microemulsions. By using the DPD simulation, the emulsifying capacity of different components can be predicted, which is of great importance to the deve...