Role of Chemisorbing Species in Growth at Liquid Metal-Electrolyte Interfaces Revealed by in Situ X-Ray Scattering

Abstract

Liquid-liquid interfaces offer intriguing possibilities for nanomaterials growth. Especially, growth at liquid metal surfaces has recently received renewed interest. Here, fundamental interface-related mechanisms that control the growth behavior in these systems are studied for the case of Pb halide compound formation at the interface between liquid mercury electrode and aqueous salt solutions, using in situ X-ray reflectivity and grazing incidence X-ray diffraction, supplemented by electrochemical measurements and optical microscopy. The nucleation and growth of these compounds at potentials in the regime of Pb de-amalgamation was investigated in NaX + PbX2 (X = F, Cl, Br) to systematically explore the role of the halide species. X-ray reflectivity studies reveal the rapid formation of well-defined ultrathin precursor adlayers in Cl- and Br-containing solution. This adlayer formation is followed by subsequent quasi-epitaxial growth of Pb(OH)X bulk crystals, that are oriented with the c-axis along the surface normal. In contrast, growth in F-containing solution proceeds by slow formation of a more disordered deposit, resulting in random bulk crystal orientations on the Hg surface. A detailed structural analysis of the Pb(OH)Br and Pb(OH)Cl precursor adlayers reveals that they determine the orientation of the subsequently formed bulk crystals, with the arrangement in the adlayer providing a template. Together with our previous results on the pseudo-epitaxial growth of PbFBr on Hg (A. Elsen, et al., Proc.Nat.Acad.Sci., 2013, 110, 6663), these data reveal the decisive role of the interface chemistry, especially the strong chemisorption of the anions bromide and chloride, in steering the formation of these textured deposits at the liquid metal surface.