ABSTRACT
I. INTRODUCTION This chapter deals with the use of amphiphilic systems for the detoxification of hazardous or unwanted chemicals. Whereas the principles will be seen to be of rather broad applicability, the focus on specific systems will be narrower and will be discussed in this section.
A. Amphiphilic Systems These systems are restricted here to ‘‘organized’’ fluids based on surfactants, such as micellar solutions, microemulsions, emulsions, and lyotropic mesophases. The surfactants considered, for reasons to be discussed later, are principally cationic, although nonionic surfactants may be useful for separation applications. The former are generally quaternary ammonium salts with one or two long alkyl chains, and the latter can range from polyoxyethylene (PEO) alkyl ethers to PEO/polypropylene oxide (PPO) block copolymers. All of the amphiphilic systems considered here contain water in some amount as one of the components. It may be noted at the outset, however, that nonaqueous amphiphilic systems have been developed that contain a polar organic solvent (e.g., formamide) in place of water. In all cases, the chemical(s) to be detoxified will be introduced into the condensed-phase amphiphilic system, along with any necessary reagents. In this regard, some clarification of terms will be useful. Detoxification is normally taken to mean that the material under consideration is chemically transformed into a nonhazardous (or much less hazardous) substance or substances; decontamination is more generic and may refer to either chemical destruction (detoxification) or simply physical
