Professor Blum is supported by a grant from the Theoretical and Computational Chemistry Program to perform theoretical studies of the thermodynamic properties of ionic solutions. Since many chemical reactions involve ionic species in solution, an improved theory of ionic behavior is an important first step in understanding chemical reactions in solution and at electrode surfaces. Professor Blum will employ the scaling properties of the Mean Spherical Approximation introduced in the Ornstein Zernike theory of ionic solutions. This theory is one of a class of theories which is based on integral equations involving pair correlation functions. One of the concepts to be developed is that of the electric microfield which is the local fluctuating electric field as seen by an ion or molecule in solution. This quantity plays a central role in the theory of chemical kinetics and spectroscopy of ions in solution.
