Design of dialkyl surfactants from nitrilotriacetic acid as head group

New double-chain surfactants can be designed in which nitrilotriacetic acid plays the role of glycerol in phospholipids. The synthetic methodology is applied to the synthesis of (2-(bis(2-dodecylamino)-2-oxoethyl)amino)acetic acid. This is a symmetric dimeric surfactant but the methodology allows the synthesis of asymmetric double-chain surfactants as well. The Krafft temperature is 16-18 °C. The critical aggregation concentration of the new surfactant (4.76 × 10-5 mol dm-3 in NaOH 0.01 M and 25 °C; surface tension measurements) is two hundred times lower than that for sodium 2-dodecanamidoacetate, which can be considered its monoalkyl surfactant analog, indicating the enhanced surfactant properties resulting from the presence of two hydrophobic alkyl chains. The shape of the aggregates was investigated by transmission electron microscopy. At 40 °C, the main structure present in solution corresponds to vesicles and, from the size distribution of their radii, values of (0.34 ± 0.06)kT and 56.7 ± 2.6 nm were obtained for the effective bending elasticity constant and the spontaneous radius of curvature of vesicles, respectively. © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2014.