Premium
A Consideration of the Application of Koutecký‐Levich Plots in the Diagnoses of Charge‐Transfer Mechanisms at Rotated Disk Electrodes
Author(s) -
Treimer Stephen,
Tang Andrew,
Johnson Dennis C.
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
electroanalysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.574
H-Index - 128
eISSN - 1521-4109
pISSN - 1040-0397
DOI - 10.1002/1521-4109(200202)14:3<165::aid-elan165>3.0.co;2-6
Subject(s) - reciprocal , electrode , electron transfer , plot (graphics) , electron , chemistry , current (fluid) , root mean square , square root , physics , thermodynamics , mathematics , geometry , statistics , quantum mechanics , philosophy , linguistics
It has become common practice to estimate the numbers of electrons ( n , eq mol −1 ) transferred in faradaic reactions at rotated disk electrodes (RDEs) from the slope of plots of reciprocal current (1/ I ) vs. reciprocal square root of rotational velocity (1/ ω 1/2 ). This practice is based on the Koutecký‐Levich equation derived for a one‐step electron‐transfer mechanism. Furthermore, the intercept of the Koutecký‐Levich plot is assumed to be a reciprocal function of the heterogeneous rate constant ( k h , cm s −1 ) for the electron‐transfer process. In this review, we examine the validity of the practice of estimating values of n and k h for various multi‐step mechanisms at RDEs.