INTERFACIAL BEHAVIOR OF BLOCK POLYELECTROLYTES .2. AGGREGATION NUMBERS OF SURFACE MICELLES

Five independent methods for calculating the aggregation number N of the block polyelectrolyte surface micelles observed in Langmuir film balance studies/Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) films are presented. Each method relies on the examination of transmission electron photomicrographs of LB films. The values of N fall in the range of 83 to 146 with greatest confidence placed on the individual micelle area method (N = 131 +/- 35). Good agreement between all the calculation methods suggests that the model recently presented to describe the unusual entropically driven phase transition observed in pi-A isotherms for poly(styrene-block-vinylpyridinium decyl iodide) is a reasonable one.