Poly(lactic acid) microparticles with controllable morphology by hydroxyapatite stabilized pickering emulsions: Effect of pH, salt, and amphiphilic agents

Pickering Emulsions Based in Inorganic Solid Particles: From Product Development to Food Applications

Pickering emulsions (PEs) have attracted attention in different fields, such as food, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, mainly due to their good physical stability. PEs are a promising strategy to develop functional products since the particles’ oil and water phases can act as carriers of active compounds, providing multiple combinations potentiating synergistic effects. Moreover, they can answer the sustainable and green chemistry issues arising from using conventional emulsifier-based systems. In this context, this review focuses on the applicability of safe inorganic solid particles as emulsion stabilisers, discussing the main stabilisation mechanisms of oil–water interfaces. In particular, it provides evidence for hydroxyapatite (HAp) particles as Pickering stabilisers, discussing the latest advances. The main technologies used to produce PEs are also presented. From an industrial perspective, an effort was made to list new productive technologies at the laboratory scale and discuss their feasibility for scale-up. Finally, the advantages and potential applications of PEs in the food industry are also described. Overall, this review gathers recent developments in the formulation, production and properties of food-grade PEs based on safe inorganic solid particles.

Inter-droplet force between magnetically polarizable Pickering oil-in-water nanoemulsions stabilized with γ-Al2O3 nanoparticles: Role of electrostatic and electric dipolar interactions

HYPOTHESIS

The presence of nanoparticles at oil-water interface influences the interaction forces between Pickering emulsions. When charged nanoparticles are at the oil-water interface of an electrostatically stabilized emulsion, in addition to the screened Coulombic interaction, electric dipolar force also influences the total inter-droplet force profiles. An in-depth understanding of the effects of such electric dipolar forces is essential for designing colloidally stable Pickering nanoemulsions for various applications.

EXPERIMENTS

Inter-droplet forces between γ-Al₂O₃ nanoparticle stabilized oil-in-water nanoemulsion, containing superparamagnetic nanoparticles (magnetically polarizable) in the oil phase, are measured using the magnetic-chaining technique at different pH and salt concentrations. The role of mono-, di- and tri-valent salts on the inter-droplet force profiles are assessed.

FINDINGS

Force measurement studies reveal a lowering of inter-droplet spacing, within the linear chains, for higher salt concentrations due to an increased screening. Strong interfacial attachment of the charged nanoparticles results in the formation of an asymmetric charge cloud leading to an electric dipolar interaction. Incorporating the contributions of electric dipolar and screened Coulombic interactions, the theoretically estimated total repulsive force magnitudes are in good agreement with the experimental data. The obtained results offer better insights into the nature of colloidal force between charged particle stabilized nanoemulsions.

Hollow particles templated from Pickering emulsion with high thermal stability and solvent resistance: Young investigator perspective

HYPOTHESIS

Hollow particles have been used in a variety of applications and many methods have been developed. Hollow particles templated from Pickering emulsions due to nanoparticle adsorption at the oil-water interface usually suffer from the collapsed morphologies and low thermal and solvent stability and enhancement of the shell can significantly improve the hollow particle performance.

EXPERIMENTS

This paper reports hollow particles templated from Pickering emulsion droplets in combination with UV photopolymerization. The Pickering emulsions were stabilized by functional silica nanoparticles at the O/W interface and the oil phase contains photosensitive reactants, initiator, catalyst and volatile solvents. The effects of nanoparticles concentration, O/W volume ratio, pH, dispersion speed and time on the stabilization of Pickering emulsion were firstly carried out and the properties of hollow particles formed by traditional interfacial crosslinking and UV photopolymerization were systematically investigated.

FINDINGS

Compared with previous interfacial crosslinking method, the UV photopolymerization method gives much more robust shells and we show in the paper that the hollow particles have much higher solvent resistance and thermal stability. The enhancement of thermal stability and solvent resistance of the hollow particle could extend its applications to more harsh fields such as self-healing coatings used in deep sea conditions.