Enhanced oil delivery from structured surfactant formulations

Abstract

Novel spherulite-containing compositions are described. Methods for making spherulite-containing compositions are also described. Preferred embodiments include compositions comprising a surfactant component, a salt, and an oil phase, wherein the surfactant component comprises (a) about 6 to about 10 weight % sodium trideceth sulfate; (b) about 1.8 to about 3.0 weight % of a structuring agent; (c) about 1.1 to about 3.0 weight % of a foam booster; (d) water; and (e) about 0.2 to about 0.8 weight % of a cationic guar gum.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS [0001] This application claims benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60 / 603,125, filed Aug. 19, 2004, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.FIELD OF THE INVENTION [0002] In certain aspects, the invention is directed to a novel approach to enhance the delivery of an oil phase to a substrate such as hair, skin or wool. Aspects of the invention use spherulite technology with selective incorporation of the oil phase after the spherulites are formed. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0003] Body wash products can be very inefficient delivery vehicles for depositing hydrophobic actives and moisturizers on the skin's surface, since most of the hydrophobic actives are rinsed away during the washing process. The majority of body wash products consist of entangled rod-like micelle formulas. Current oil-in-water body wash formulas do not form stable products at high oil concentrations, since the oils and produ...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The present invention is about making new compositions that contain spherulites. These compositions have a surfactant component, salt, oil phase, and water. The surfactant component includes sodium trideceth sulfate, a structuring agent, a foam booster, and cationic guar gum. The technical effect of this invention is to provide new methods for making compositions that have spherulites, which can be useful in various applications such as industrial cleaning and personal care products.

Problems solved by technology

Body wash products can be very inefficient delivery vehicles for depositing hydrophobic actives and moisturizers on the skin's surface, since most of the hydrophobic actives are rinsed away during the washing process.

Current oil-in-water body wash formulas do not form stable products at high oil concentrations, since the oils and product aqueous base have significantly different densities.

Since micellar based body washes can have high viscosities, but not long range structure (substantially larger than the dimensions of the surfactant micelles themselves), products containing high concentrations of oil will be unstable and phase separate with time.

However, these systems can require heat to make, may be unstable at higher oil concentrations, and may result in a significant impairment of cleansing properties at low surfactant concentrations.

Addition of salts increases the size of the rod micelles thereof increasing zero shear viscosity (i.e., viscosity when sitting in bottle) which helps suspend particles but also increases critical shear rate (point at which product becomes shear thinning; higher critical shear rates means product is more difficult to pour).

To form such lamellar compositions, however, some compromises have to be made.

First, generally higher amounts of surfactant are required to form the lamellar phase.

Second, only certain surfactants will form this phase and, therefore, the choice of surfactants is restricted.

In short, lamellar compositions are generally more desirable (especially for suspending emollient and for providing consumer aesthetics), but more expensive in that they generally require more surfactant and are more restricted in the range of surfactants that can be used.

Again, however, they are generally more expensive to make (e.g., they are restricted as to which surfactants can be used and often require greater concentration of surfactants).

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