Electrical Interaction between Two Planar, Parallel Dissimilar Surfaces in a General Electrolytic Solution

Abstract

The electrical interaction between two planar, parallel dissimilar surfaces, which may have different charged conditions arising from different ion-adsorption mechanisms, in an arbitrary electrolytic solution is investigated theoretically. The electrical interaction force and the interaction energy between these surfaces are evaluated, and analytical expressions for various charged conditions under the Debye-Huckel condition are derived. In general, assuming constant surface potential and assuming constant surface charge density lead respectively to the lower and the upper bounds in the electrical interaction energy between two surfaces. We show that assuming a linear relation between surface potential and surface charge density under the Debye-Huckel condition, as is often done in the literature, is appropriate for two planar parallel surfaces only but becomes inadequate for other orientations or nonplanar surfaces. The present approach does not have this limitation.