The molecular structure and orientation of interfacial water molecules at the air/water interface in the presence of soluble cationic and anionic surfactants has been characterized. We have employed vibrational sum frequency generation (VSFG) to probe the orientation of interfacial water molecules as a function of both bulk surfactant concentration and solution ion strength. The observed ordering of interfacial water molecules is manifested by an enhancement of the OH stretching modes in the VSFG spectra. We attribute the observed enhancement to an alignment of the interfacial water molecules induced by the large electrostatic field present at these charged interfaces. The nature of this enhancement is further explored by studying mixed (cationic and anionic) surfactant systems as well as surfactant systems at different ionic strengths. From these studies we find that the interfacial water molecules attain their highest degree of alignment at surface surfactant concentrations well below maximum surface coverage.

The molecular structure and orientation of water molecules at an air/water interface has been measured in the presence of cationic and anionic surfactants. We have employed vibrational sum frequency generation to obtain the vibrational spectrum of both the surfactant and water molecules at the water surface. In the presence of the charged surfactant, the water molecules show a high degree of orientation with the directionality dependent upon the anionic or cationic nature of the surfactant headgroup. Relative to the charged surfactants, uncharged surfactants show minimal impact on interfacial water ordering. The results presented here provide valuable new insight into how the interfacial water molecules orient at the air/water interface in the presence of surfactants with different headgroups as well as how the relative order of the surfactants differ for these different amphiphiles.