Scaling Perspectives of Underscreening in Concentrated Electrolyte Solutions

2023/08/20 by S. A. Safran, Safran, Samuel, P. Pincus +1 · 3 citations
Chemistry · Physics and Astronomy · #Electrostatics and Colloid Interactions #FOS: Physical sciences #Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft) #Spectroscopy and Quantum Chemical Studies

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2308.10189

openalex publication_date 2023/08/20 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

We present a scaling view of underscreening observed in salt solutions in the range of concentrations greater than about 1M, in which the screening length increases with concentration. The system consists of hydrated clusters of positive and negative ions with a single unpaired ion as suggested by recent simulations. The environment of this ion is more hydrated than average which leads to a self-similar situation in which the size of this environment scales with the screening length. The prefactor involves the local dielectric constant and the cluster density. The scaling arguments as well as the cluster model lead to scaling of the screening length with the ion concentration, in agreement with observations.

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