Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- 1 Introduction and Overview
- 2 Preparatory Concepts
- 3 The Governing Equations for an Electrically Conducting Fluid
- 4 The Essentials of Viscous Flow
- 5 Heat and Mass Transfer Phenomena in Channels and Tubes
- 6 Introduction to Electrostatics
- 7 Elements of Electrochemistry and the Electrical Double Layer
- 8 Elements of Molecular and Cell Biology
- 9 Electrokinetic Phenomena
- 10 Essential Numerical Methods
- 11 Molecular Simulations
- 12 Applications
- Appendix A Matched Asymptotic Expansions
- Appendix B Vector Operations in Curvilinear Coordinates
- Appendix C Web Sites
- Appendix D A Semester Course Syllabus
- Bibliography
- Index
7 - Elements of Electrochemistry and the Electrical Double Layer
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2013
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- 1 Introduction and Overview
- 2 Preparatory Concepts
- 3 The Governing Equations for an Electrically Conducting Fluid
- 4 The Essentials of Viscous Flow
- 5 Heat and Mass Transfer Phenomena in Channels and Tubes
- 6 Introduction to Electrostatics
- 7 Elements of Electrochemistry and the Electrical Double Layer
- 8 Elements of Molecular and Cell Biology
- 9 Electrokinetic Phenomena
- 10 Essential Numerical Methods
- 11 Molecular Simulations
- 12 Applications
- Appendix A Matched Asymptotic Expansions
- Appendix B Vector Operations in Curvilinear Coordinates
- Appendix C Web Sites
- Appendix D A Semester Course Syllabus
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Introduction
A working definition of the field of electrochemistry is the study of charged chemical and biological material. The field of electrochemistry appears to have begun over 200 years ago, with the discovery by Galvani that a frog's limbs responded to the touching of its nerves by a scalpel with a severe twitch when the scalpel was electrically charged by a nearby source (Bockris & Reddy, 1998).
Much of electrochemistry involves the study of the properties of ionic solutions first studied by P. Debye and E. Hückel in the 1920s. The modern field of electrochemistry is separated into two related but distinct aspects: ionic solutions and electrode kinetics. Of course, in the problems of interest in this book, the two are related; however, Bockris and Reddy (1998) point out that the two fields today are significantly different, with the field of what they call “electrodics” branching out to applications in the automobile industry, the study of batteries, and fuel cells.
In this chapter, the essential principles of electrochemistry are presented, enabling a thorough understanding of the chemical principles involved in the study of electrokinetic phenomena to follow. Many biofluids are aqueous mixtures of electrolytes, which are species that are either positively or negatively charged. The mixtures of interest are aqueous and are usually dilute in the electrolyte species. An example of a common electrolyte mixture is phosphate buffered saline (PBS), which contains five different ionic species in an aqueous solution.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Essentials of Micro- and NanofluidicsWith Applications to the Biological and Chemical Sciences, pp. 230 - 282Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2012