ALTERNATION IN THE STRUCTURE OF WATER-IN-OIL MICROEMULSIONS BY THE ACTION OF POLY(ETHYLENE GLYCOL)

摘要

One of the ways of changing the properties of water media in lipid systems is the replacement of a part of water by some lipid with a different polarity. For this purpose water-soluble poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) with low molecular weight can be used. It has been found that PEG produces dehydration of the phosphatidylcholine (PC) bilayers due to water binding to polymer. However in all studies of PEG effects on the lipid systems the bilayer structures or direct micelles dispersed in water were mostly used. Until recently the PEG interactions with the lipid-based reverse micelle dispersions were not studied. The reverse micelles are the spherical droplets with water in a central core surrounded by a monolayer of amphipatic lipid molecules, which have thier polar head groups facing the water, and thier hydrophobic tails oriented towards the continuous oil phase.