Changes in the CMC/ZrO2 system properties in the presence of hydrocarbon, fluorocarbon and silicone surfactants

The influence of cationic surfactants: hydrocarbon - myristyltrimethylammonium bromide (MTAB), silicone - Silquat J2 (C-Si) and fluorine one (S-106A) on the stabilizing properties of the carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC)/zirconia (ZrO2) system was studied using the spectrophotometric measurements. The obtained results prove that all used polysaccharide/surfactant mixtures can be used as stabilizers of zirconia suspensions, however, the CMC/S-106A mixture is the most effective. The reason for that is formation of the CMC/S-106A complexes with 1:2 stoichiometry and their adsorption on the metal oxide surface. In order to find possible mechanisms of stabilization the CMC adsorption on the ZrO2 was studied. To obtain some information on the structure of the polysaccharide/surfactant/oxide adsorption layer, the surface charge density measurements were conducted. The obtained results can be applied in the fields of ceramics and catalysis.