Synthesis of environment friendly nonionic surfactants from sugar base and characterization of interfacial properties for detergent application

In this study, environment friendly nonionic surfactants were synthesized from sugar base and their structure was characterized by 1H-NMR, 13C-NMR and FT-IR. The newly synthesized SA08 series surfactants showed excellent interfacial properties such as low CMC, surface tension and interfacial tension, and superior foam stability. Detergency tests using three different types of artificial soils have revealed that the synthesized surfactants showed moderately good detergency presumably due to excellent interfacial properties and stereoscopic molecular structure of SA08 series surfactants. Environmental compatibility test showed that SA08-07 surfactant exhibited low toxicity compared with conventional nonionic and anionic surfactants and excellent biodegradability.

Synthetic route of environment friendly nonionic surfactants. Figure optionsDownload as PowerPoint slide