The structure of liquid water is highly complex and diverse. The structure of liquid water has become a world-famous problem. In 2005, "Science" published 125 scientific problems for the next 25 years. The 21st question was "What is the structure of water?" 96% of water in nature exists in the form of various salt solutions. Compared with the pure water structure, the solution structure includes not only the bulk water structure but also the solvated ion structure and ion association structure. Therefore, the structure of the solution is far more complex than that of pure water. The solution structure is often "inherited" into its descendant crystals, which determines the purity, size and morphology of the precipitated crystals, and further affects the purity and particle size of the product. Some discoveries of mother liquor structure often lead directly to some major high-tech inventions. At present, most domestic research on solution structure is based on computer simulation, and there are not many reports on direct experimental measurement.
The team of Associate Professor Zhou Yongquan from ISL, has built the first domestic solution structure X-ray scattering research platform that can realize the reflection of the flat sample cell and the cylindrical geometric transmission in the experimental research of the solution structure, and developed the solution structure X-ray scattering data analysis Software package (XNSA). In terms of solution structure computational chemistry, the research team built a special high-performance computing cluster for solution chemistry, combining quantum chemistry ab initio (ab initio), ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) and classical molecular dynamics (MD) with experimental research, can achieve mutual complementation and mutual verification. In terms of the application of large-scale scientific devices, the research team took the lead in researching liquid structures on synchrotron radiation sources and spallation neutron sources in China. In recent years, the team has used X-ray, neutron scattering and computational chemistry methods to study the structural information of complex multi-component, low-scattering solution samples represented by borate solutions, and has made some important progress. More than 50 SCI journal papers. has been published.The research team has achieved synchronization with the world's top expert teams in solution structure experimental methods and data analysis methods, and has achieved surpassing and leading in some fields such as data analysis software development, calculation simulation and experimental results.
Recently, the team of Associate Professor Zhou Yongquan wrote an article "Application of X-ray and Neutron Scattering in the Study of Solution Structure" in "Salt Lake Research". This article introduces the experiment of using X-ray and neutron scattering to study the structure of the solution (the reflection method of the flat sample cell and the cylindrical geometric transmission method) and the method of data analysis (theoretical model calculation based on the Debye scattering model and reverse Monte Carlo).At the same time, this article reviews the application of X-ray and neutron scattering in the research of pure water structure, borate aqueous solution structure and "dihydrogen bond" in solution by the research team in recent years. The problems of X-ray and neutron scattering in the solution structure are briefly described, and the development direction of the solution structure research is put forward. For details, please see "Salt Lake Research" Issue 3 of 2020-Salt Lake Chemical Special Issue "Research Highlights": 1-17 pages.
Research on X-ray and Neutron Scattering of Solution Structure