Cleaning ability of Washing Powders

Research Paper (undergraduate) from the year 2015 in the subject Chemistry - Other, grade: A, course: IB Chemistry HL, language: English, abstract: I researched and studied the effect of temperature and concentration of the detergent, Sodium Lauryl Sulphate, on the cleaning ability of various popular washing powders, in terms of surface tension. Furthermore, it was the minimum concentration of LAS that must be present and maximum value of the surface was determined. I researched and found that the cleaning ability is a function of the surface tension and that washing powders contain surfactants or detergents like Sodium Lauryl Sulphate (LAS) that lower the surface tension. Surface tension causes the surface portion of liquid to be attracted to another surface. Thus lowering the surface tension allows the water to spread further and can penetrate into the holes and pores of the surface giving a better cleaning performance. However, these detergents only work if they are at their Critical Micelle Concentration. Keeping the CMC of LAS in mind, I took different concentrations of it so as to find the maximum value of surface tension that must be passed for effective cleaning.