0000000000481985
AUTHOR
Wim G. Bouwman
Influence of a hydrophilic spacer on the structure of a phospholipid monolayer
We present the results of thermodynamical and X-ray grazing incidence diffraction experiments performed on Langmuir monolayers of ether lipids with hydrophilic spacers between the glycerol backbone and the phosphatidylcholine head group: DHPC, DH-E01-PC, and DH-E02-PC. As a spacer the oxy-ethylene group is used, which is a typical hydrophilic unit of non-ionic tensides. It turns out that the introduction of the hydrophilic spacers leads to a fluidization of the monolayer and reduces the tilt angle of the chains.
Chirality effects on 2D phase transitions
Monolayers of the racemate and pure enantiomers of 1-hexadecyl-glycerol were investigated by grazing incidence X-ray diffraction (GID) at 5 and 20 °C on compression from 0 mN m−1 to pressures greater than 30 mN m−1. The racemate lattice is centred-rectangular for both temperatures at all investigated pressures. However, at both temperatures, there is a sharp phase transition from a low-pressure phase, in which the molecules are tilted towards nearest neighbours (NN) and the distortion azimuth also points towards NN, to a high-pressure phase, in which the molecules are tilted towards next-nearest neighbours (NNN) and an NNN-distorted lattice is observed. At 5 °C, the transition pressure is 1…