Ions in Water and Biophysical Implications From Chaos to Cosmos
Over the past decade, numerous books have attempted to explain ions in aqueous solutions in relation to biophysical phenomena. Ions in Water and Biophysical Implications, from Chaos to Cosmos offers a physicochemical point of view of the spread of this ma
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Yizhak Marcus
Ions in Water and Biophysical Implications From Chaos to Cosmos
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Yizhak Marcus Institute of Chemistry The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Jerusalem Israel
ISBN 978-94-007-4646-6 ISBN 978-94-007-4647-3 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-4647-3 Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York Library of Congress Control Number: 2012945903 © Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2012 No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception of any material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com)
Preface
It is so often stated that water is a ubiquitous liquid on earth and a general solvent for many kinds of solutes that such statements sound as clichés. Nevertheless, they are correct and merit discussion. Other common statements are that the properties of water are unique among liquids and are difficult to understand: “No one really understands water. It’s embarrassing to admit it, but the stuff that covers two-thirds of our planet is still a mystery. Worse, the more we look, the more the problems accumulate: new techniques probing deeper into the molecular architecture of liquid water are throwing up more puzzles.” (Ball 2008). Unfortunately, to date this situation keeps being rather true and should be accorded a more comprehensive treatment. On the other hand, ions are found in a large variety of environments. These include a non-environment where the ions are isolated in vacuum, as generated for example in a mass spectrometer. Ions in a gaseous phase include clusters of ionized water vapour relating to cloud formation. Ions in condensed phases may occur in solids, whether crystalline or disordered (glasses) but also in liquids, including room temperature ionic liquids or molten salts at higher temperatures. In such condensed phases the ions are in close vicinity to one another with strong coulombic interactions between their charges that tend to order the ions (at least over short distances in liquids) with alternating positive and negative charges. Ions also exist in liquid solutions in a variety of solvents, whether non-aqueous, aqueous, or mixed. When ions are placed in a solvent, by the dissolution of an electrolyte capable of extensive ionic dissociation, the properties of such solutions cannot be estimated simply as weighted sums of the properties of the individual components, solvent and ions. This results from the strong interactions between the ions and the solvent molecules, which merit intensive investigation in order to comprehend the properties of such solutions. The ions tend to be solvated in solution with a solvation shell around them, the solvent separating the ions from one another, their
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