Mercury drop electrode
A major problem in voltammetry is electrode contamination in solid electrode materials such as platinum, gold and carbon. This problem can be solved with the help of polarography , a voltammetric method in which a mercury drop electrode is used as the working electrode . The surface of the electrode is continuously renewed by the formation of mercury droplets at the end of a capillary (diameter 50 ... 100 µm), which continuously fall off. The resulting cyclically changing surface of the electrode causes oscillations in the classic direct current polarogram. The frequency of the drop fall can be controlled by the height of a mercury storage vessel or pneumatically . The mercury drop electrode was known long before Heyrovský , the inventor of polarography (e.g.) He was the first to come up with the idea of measuring the electrolysis current that flows through this electrode during polarization.
Individual evidence
- ^ Joseph Wang: Analytical Electrochemistry . 3. Edition. Wiley-VCH / John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, New Jersey 2006, ISBN 0-471-67879-1 , pp. 69 , doi : 10.1002 / 0471790303 .
- ↑ Jaroslav Heyrovský , Jaroslav Kúta: Fundamentals of polarography . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1965, p. 21 (also published as Principles of Polarography , Academic Press, 1965).
- ↑ Report on the use of the mercury drop electrode by James Moser, 1887, page 254
- ↑ Report on the use of the mercury drop electrode by Julius Miesler 1888, pages 582-583