ARTICLE NO. CS964560 NOTE Imaging of Dihexadecylphosphate Vesicles by AFM and Counterion Effect on Their Size and Stability cations employed in this study were Li / , K / , Na / , Cs / and among the organics the guanidinium cation, C(NH 2 ) / 3 . The organic cation, in addition The effect of counterions on vesicles prepared from dihexadecylto electrostatic interaction with the phosphate group, also shares the property phosphate is investigated. Alkali metal ions as well as an organic of complementarity with the same group. The latter property can in principle guanidinium counterion have been employed and it has been found affect the interaction of the counterion with the interface of the vesicle. that the size of the vesicles is dependent on the size of the counterions. Specifically, the bigger the counterion the smaller are the MATERIALS AND METHODS vesicles that are formed. The vesicles exhibited very good stability which was not significantly affected by the nature of the counterion. It is interesting to note that a subtle chemical modification, Synthesis viz., in the nature of the counterion, can have a significant bearing
For the synthesis of dihexadecylphosphate, phosphorus oxychloride was on the size and morphology of the vesicles. The implications in reacted with hexadecanol according to the method employed by Kunitake self-assembly occurring in biological systems are therefore easy to et al. (14). The salts with lithium, sodium, potassium and cesium were appreciate.