Structure and Responsiveness of Colloidal Lattices at Ionic Liquid-Water Interfaces

This research focuses on the utilization of multi-responsive ionic microgel particles to serve as potential stabilizers to develop ionic liquid based Pickering emulsions. Being soft and responsiveness, microgel particles behave noticeably different from rigid particles at the emulsion interface. Here we report the formation of highly structured assembly of fluorescent core-shell ionic microgel colloidal lattices at ionic liquid-water interfaces, in contrast to oil-water interfaces. Moreover, by tuning environmental stimuli such as pH and temperature the lattice packing and number of defect sites may vary at the interface.