Wang Li-Min, He Fang, Richert Ranko
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona 85287-1604, USA.
Phys Rev Lett. 2004 Mar 5;92(9):095701. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.92.095701. Epub 2004 Mar 3.
We explore the dynamics of viscous propylene glycol (PG) near its glass transition for the case of soft spatial confinement. The supercooled liquid is geometrically restricted by the reverse micelles of a glass-forming PG/AOT/decalin microemulsion, with the intramicellar dynamics being probed by triplet state solvation dynamics. While hard confinement by porous solids is known to result in slower dynamics and an increased glass transition temperature T(g) of PG, the nanodroplets suspended in a more fluid environment display faster structural relaxation, equivalent to a reduction of T(g) as observed in freestanding polymer films.
