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Updated: Aug 18, 2026

Optimization of Crystal Growth for Neutron Macromolecular Crystallography
Published on: March 13, 2021
Ion-induced nucleation: the importance of chemistry
Shawn M Kathmann1, Gregory K Schenter, Bruce C Garrett
1Chemical Sciences Division, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA 99352, USA.
Abstract:
Experiments have shown that ions can substantially increase vapor-to-liquid nucleation rates. However, interpretation of these experiments is complicated by ambiguities arising from the manner in which the ions are produced. Several studies have concluded that water has a general preference for anions over cations. We show that specification of the ion's sign alone is insufficient to provide an understanding of the aqueous ionic cluster thermodynamics and that classical ion-induced nucleation theory does not treat the cluster physics properly to describe ion-induced nucleation accurately.
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