Adding salt to an aqueous solution of t-butanol

No Thumbnail Available

Date

2006-04-21

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

American Institute of Physics

Abstract

Recent neutron scattering experiments on aqueous salt solutions of amphiphilic t-butanol by Bowron and Finney [Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 215508 (2002); J. Chem. Phys. 118, 8357 (2003)] suggest the formation of t-butanol pairs, bridged by a chloride ion via O–H[centered ellipsis]Cl– hydrogen bonds, leading to a reduced number of intermolecular hydrophobic butanol-butanol contacts. Here we present a joint experimental/theoretical study on the same system, using a combination of molecular dynamics (MD) simulations and nuclear magnetic relaxation measurements. Both MD simulation and experiment clearly support the more classical scenario of an enhanced number of hydrophobic contacts in the presence of salt, as it would be expected for purely hydrophobic solutes. [T. Ghosh et al., J. Phys. Chem. B 107, 612 (2003)]. Although our conclusions arrive at a structurally completely distinct scenario, the molecular dynamics simulation results are within the experimental error bars of the Bowron and Finney data.

Description

Table of contents

Keywords

Citation

Paschek, D.; Geiger, A.; Herve, M. J.; Suter, D.: Adding salt to an aqueous solution of t-butanol : Is hydrophobic association enhanced or reduced?. In: Journal of Chemical Physics Jg. 124(2006), 154508.