Double Layer in Ionic Liquids: Overscreening versus Crowding
Author(s)
Bazant, Martin Z.; Storey, Brian D.; Kornyshe, Alexei A.
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We develop a simple Landau-Ginzburg-type continuum theory of solvent-free ionic liquids and use it to predict the structure of the electrical double layer. The model captures overscreening from short-range correlations, dominant at small voltages, and steric constraints of finite ion sizes, which prevail at large voltages. Increasing the voltage gradually suppresses overscreening in favor of the crowding of counterions in a condensed inner layer near the electrode. This prediction, the ion profiles, and the capacitance-voltage dependence are consistent with recent computer simulations and experiments on room-temperature ionic liquids, using a correlation length of order the ion size.
Date issued
2011-01Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Chemical Engineering; Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of MathematicsJournal
Physical review letters
Publisher
American Physical Society
Citation
Bazant, Martin, Brian Storey, and Alexei Kornyshev. “Double Layer in Ionic Liquids: Overscreening versus Crowding.” Physical Review Letters 106.4 (2011) : n. pag. © 2011 American Physical Society
Version: Final published version
ISSN
0031-9007