Surfactants represent the most important group of detergent components.
They are present in all types of detergents. In general, surfactants
are water-soluble surface-active agents comprising a hydrophobic group
(a long alkyl chain) attached to a hydrophilic group.
The hydrophilic group is usually added synthetically to a hydrophobic
material to produce a compound that is soluble in water. However,
this solubilization does not necessarily produce a detergent, because
detergency depends on the balance of the molecular weight of the
hydrophobic portion to that of the hydrophilic portion.
Therefore, there are four main groups of surfactants: anionic, cationic,
nonionic, and amphoteric[1-4].
A substance that
lowers surface tension and has properties
of wetting, foaming, detergency, dispersion, and emulsification.
