Two-Step Freezing in Alkane Monolayers on Colloidal Silica Nanoparticles: From a Stretched-Liquid to an Interface-Frozen State

The crystallization behavior of an archetypical soft/hard hybrid nanocomposite, that is, an n-octadecane C₁₈/SiO₂-nanoparticle composite, was investigated by a combination of differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and variable-temperature solid-state ¹³C nuclear magnetic resonance (VT solid-state ¹³C NMR) as a function of silica nanoparticles loading. Two latent heat peaks prior to bulk freezing, observed for composites with high silica loading, indicate that a sizable fraction of C₁₈ molecules involve two phase transitions unknown from the bulk C₁₈. Combined with the NMR measurements as well as experiments on alkanes and alkanols at planar amorphous silica surfaces reported in the literature, this phase behavior can be attributed to a transition toward a 2D liquid-like monolayer and subsequently a disorder-to-order transition upon cooling. The second transition results in the formation of a interface-frozen monolayer of alkane molecules with their molecular long axis parallel to the nanoparticles’ surface normal. Upon heating, the inverse phase sequence was observed, however, with a sizable thermal hysteresis in accord with the characteristics of the first-order phase transition. A thermodynamic model considering a balance of interfacial bonding, chain stretching elasticity, and entropic effects quantitatively accounts for the observed behavior. Complementary synchrotron-based wide-angle X-ray diffraction (WAXD) experiments allow us to document the strong influence of this peculiar interfacial freezing behavior on the surrounding alkane melts and in particular the nucleation of a rotator phase absent in the bulk C₁₈.