Molecular dynamics simulation study of hydration of uranyl nitrate in supercritical water: Dissecting the effect of uranyl ion concentration from solvent density

Abstract

All atom molecular dynamics simulations of uranyl ions in supercritical water are used to dissect the effects of concentration of uranyl ions and density of water on various structural and dynamic properties of the solutions. The analyses of radial distribution functions as a function of concentration of the uranyl ion and water density reveal that the effect of the former on the local structure is negligible as compared to the same of the later. The number of hydration water of the uranyl ion has been observed to increase with increasing density of the water, but it decreases with the increasing concentration of the uranyl ions. The orientational distributions are observed to be independent of variation in concentration of the uranyl ion, same as the case was with water density. The translational and rotational dynamics of the water molecules have been investigated from the respective mean squared displacements and time correlation functions. Although increase of both the concentration of the uranyl ions and the density of water reduces translational diffusivity of water as well as uranyl ions, the effect of changing water density is more than that of uranyl concentrations. However, orientational relaxation of various molecular vectors of the water molecule is practically unchanged with any variation in concentration of the uranyl ions and it changes only slightly with the change in water density. Unlike at ambient condition, orientational dynamics at supercritical conditions remains virtually unchanged with the change in uranyl ion concentration.