Issue 10, 2015

Charge separation and isolation in strong water droplet impacts

Abstract

Charge separation in condensed matter after strong impacts is a general and intriguing phenomenon in nature, which is often identified and described but not necessarily well understood in terms of a quantitative mechanistic picture. Here we show that charge separation naturally occurs if water droplets/clusters or ice particles with embedded charge carriers, e.g., ions, encounter a high energy impact with subsequent dispersion – even if the involved kinetic energy is significantly below the molecular ionization energy. We find that for low charge carrier concentrations (c < 0.01 mol L−1) a simple statistical Poisson model describes the charge distribution in the resulting molecular “fragments” or aggregates. At higher concentrations Coulomb interactions between the charge carriers become relevant, which we describe by a Monte Carlo approach. Our models are compared to experimental data for strong (laser) impacts on liquid micro beams and discussed for the charge generation in cluster-impact mass spectrometry on cosmic dust detectors where particle kinetic energies are below the plasma threshold. Taken together, a simple and intuitive but quantitative microscopic model is obtained, which may contribute to the understanding of a larger range of phenomena related to charge generation and separation in nature.

Graphical abstract: Charge separation and isolation in strong water droplet impacts

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
03 Dec 2014
Accepted
02 Feb 2015
First published
02 Feb 2015

Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2015,17, 6858-6864

Charge separation and isolation in strong water droplet impacts

F. Wiederschein, E. Vöhringer-Martinez, A. Beinsen, F. Postberg, J. Schmidt, R. Srama, F. Stolz, H. Grubmüller and B. Abel, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2015, 17, 6858 DOI: 10.1039/C4CP05618C

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