No abstract

Mixed surfactant solutions are studied to understand their synergistic effects. Here we report the micellization properties of mixed surfactant solutions of the gemini surfactant N,N'-bis(dimethyldodecyl)-1,2-ethanediammoniumdibromide (12-2-12) with the imidazolium ionic liquid 1-dodecyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide (C12mimBr) investigated by isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC), conductometry, fluorimetry, and dynamic light scattering (DLS). A two-parameter Margules model was successfully used to correlate the cmc values and calculate the compositions and activity coefficients of the two components in the mixed micelle phase for 12-2-12/C12mimBr aqueous solutions with different overall surfactant compositions. The dissociation degree of counterion, the thermodynamic quantities of micellization, and the excess thermodynamic quantities for the mixed micelle were calculated and discussed. The ITC experiment in the low overall surfactant composition region showed a second phase transition. A thermodynamic model was proposed to explore phase behaviors of two different types of micelle and their solution, which was further confirmed by fluorescence and DLS studies.

We have used three-wavelength UV-spectrophotometry to study the reaction of the alkaline fading of phenolphthalein in the critical solution of 2-butoxyethanol + water. It was found that when the temperature was far away from the critical point, the values of the natural logarithm of the rate constant k and the natural logarithm of the chemical equilibrium K determined in our experiments had good linear relationships with the reciprocal of temperature, which served as the backgrounds and were used for correcting k and K in the critical region. The critical slowing down of the reaction and the critical anomaly of the chemical equilibrium were detected near the critical point. The value of the critical exponent characterizing the slowing down effect of the reaction rate was obtained to be 0.156, which was close to the value 0.11 associated with the heat capacity divergence and agreed with the theoretical prediction. The experimental result also confirmed the theoretical prediction of 0.11 for the critical exponent characterizing the weak divergence of the singularity of the chemical equilibrium.

Microbial moribunds after microbial biomass turnover (microbial residues) contribute to the formation and stabilization of soil carbon pools; however, the factors influencing their accumulation on a global scale remain unclear. Here, we synthesized data for 268 amino sugar concentrations (biomarkers of microbial residues) in grassland and forest ecosystems for meta-analysis. We found that soil organic carbon, soil carbon-to-nitrogen ratio, and aridity index were key factors that predicted microbial residual carbon accumulation. Threshold aridity index and soil carbon-to-nitrogen ratios were identified (~0.768 and ~9.583, respectively), above which microbial residues decreased sharply. The aridity index threshold was associated with the humid climate range. We suggest that the soil carbon-to-nitrogen ratio threshold may coincide with a sharp decrease in fungal abundance. Although dominant factors vary between ecosystem and climate zone, with soil organic carbon and aridity index being important throughout, our findings suggest that climate and soil environment may govern microbial residue accumulation.