Abstract: Oil-water emulsions have wide range of applications in the field of petrochemicals, food, medicine and others. The stability of emulsion has been a research hotspot. This paper reviewed research methods of emulsion stability in recent years, summarized the progress of research techniques from three aspects and made brief comparison of the advantages and disadvantages of different methods of the same scale. On the macro-scale, emulsion stability analyzers and low-field NMR are used to characterize the phase separation process, which simplifies the test operation and renders a more accurate result. On mesoscopic scale, the in situ characterization of emulsion droplet size can be achieved by fitting calculation of the optical and NMR results. On the micro-scale, the accurate characterization of interfacial film stability is realized by the development and introduction of micropipette, microscopic observation technologies and others, which includes the research of mechanical strength, thickness and morphology of interfacial film. In addition, this article also identified the integrated use of different methods in in-depth inquiring the stability mechanism, analyzed trends of research methods in oil-water emulsion stability, and noted that in situ characterization technology is the development direction of emulsion stability research.

Key words: emulsions, stability, multiscale, phase separation, droplet, interfacial film

摘要： 油水乳状液在石油化工、食品、医药等领域有广泛的应用,其中乳状液的稳定性一直是人们研究的热点。本文回顾了近年来乳状液稳定性的研究方法,从宏观相分离、介观液滴粒度及微观界面膜稳定性3个不同尺度对油水乳状液稳定性研究技术的进展进行综述,并简要比较了同尺度不同研究方法的优劣。宏观尺度上,稳定性分析仪和低场核磁共振的引入使得乳状液相分离过程的表征更加准确便捷;介观尺度上,通过对分散相表征结果的拟合计算实现对乳状液液滴粒度的原位表征;微观尺度上,微量吸液管技术、显微观测等表征技术的发展和引入使得界面膜的机械强度、厚度及形态结构三方面的研究更加深入,从而更加直接准确地表征界面膜的稳定性。此外,本文还重点对综合运用不同尺度研究方法全面深入探究乳状液稳定机制进行了论述,并指出原位表征技术是乳状液稳定性研究方法的重要发展方向。

关键词: 乳液, 稳定性, 多尺度, 相分离, 液滴, 界面膜