Succinylation of Non‐ionic Surfactants: Physicochemical Characterization, Functional Properties, Biodegradability and Mathematical Modeling of the Polarity Tuning

Anionic surfactants comprising succinic acid end groups were synthesized by succinylation of non‐ionic surfactants using succinic anhydride as a potentially bio‐sourced building block. A solvent‐ and catalyst‐free synthesis was designed for succinic anhydride mono esterification with octyl‐, decyl and dodecylpolyxylosides, di‐ and tetraethylene glycol dodecylethers and glycerol monolaurate. The physicochemical and functional properties of anionic surfactants thus obtained were studied and compared with their non‐succinylated counterparts. A correlation between these properties and the polarity changes induced by the addition of the hydrophilic succinic acid moiety was established. The biodegradability of the succinylated surfactants has also been investigated. Finally, through a desirability function approach, mathematic predictions were correlated to the properties in order to find an optimum and to discriminate surfactants with respect to targeted physicochemical properties and resulting applications.