Abstract
Abstract The electrodeposition of mercury on highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) from nitrate solution was studied using cyclic voltammetry, potentiostatic current transients, and in situ scanning tunneling microscopy (STM), in order to correlate the results of the kinetic nucleation with the deposit morphology. At relatively low overpotentials, the mercury deposition can be described by a model involving progressive nucleation on active sites and diffusion-controlled 3D growth without overlapping of diffusion zones. The deposition was initiated on step edges and surface defects forming 3D islands following the Volmer–Weber mechanism. The small number of atoms in the critical nucleus ( n k =1), together with the linear log J vs. ∣ η ∣ dependence, indicated that the nucleation process can be described by the atomistic model.
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