ABSTRACT
Interest in stimuli-responsive surfactants is steadily growing, although the stimuli-responsiveness of surfactants is in fact an essential property of surfactants that exhibit self-assembly. We will see in the sequel that the development and use of various kinds of stimuli-responsive surfactants in producing novel stimuli-responsive polymers and advanced materials has become a very active research area [1]. However, it is fair to say that the self-assembly exhibited by surfactants in micelle formation, reversible vesicle formation, monolayer and thin-lm formation, vesicle formation, and the formation of various types of lyotropic liquid crystalline phases are all examples of surfactant stimuli-responsiveness. This response is simply an association or aggregation in response to thermodynamic driving forces emanating from chemical potential (concentration) effects and the effects of other intensive or eld variables such as temperature and electromagnetic elds.
