Structures of water

Figure Bl.4.8. Top the lowest-energy structures of water clusters, from n = 2 -6. Bottom a sample...

The orientational structure of water near a metal surface has obvious consequences for the electrostatic potential across an interface, since any orientational anisotropy creates an electric field that interacts with the metal electrons. Hydrogen bonds are formed mainly within the adsorbate layer but also between the adsorbate and the second layer. Fig. 3 already shows quite clearly that the requirements of hydrogen bond maximization and minimization of interfacial dipoles lead to preferentially planar orientations. On the metal surface, this behavior is modified because of the anisotropy of the water/metal interactions which favors adsorption with the oxygen end towards the metal phase. 

M. L. Berkowitz, I.-C. Yeh, E. Spohr. Structure of water at the water/metal interface. Molecular dynamics computer simulations. In A. Wieckowski, ed. Interfacial Electrochemistry. New York Marcel Dekker, 1999, (in press). 

Whereas the main challenge for the first bilayer simulations has been to obtain stable bilayers with properties (e.g., densities) which compare well with experiments, more and more complex problems can be tackled nowadays. For example, lipid bilayers were set up and compared in different phases (the fluid, the gel, the ripple phase) [67,68,76,81]. The formation of large pores and the structure of water in these water channels have been studied [80,81], and the forces acting on lipids which are pulled out of a membrane have been measured [82]. The bilayer systems themselves are also becoming more complex. Bilayers made of complicated amphiphiles such as unsaturated lipids have been considered [83,84]. The effect of adding cholesterol has been investigated [85,86]. An increasing number of studies are concerned with the important complex of hpid/protein interactions [87-89] and, in particular, with the structure of ion channels [90-92]. 

Hydrophobic interactions <40 Force is a complex phenomenon determined by the degree to which the structure of water is disordered as discrete hydrophobic molecules or molecular regions coalesce. 

The presence of alcohols in the aqueous medium generally decreases grafting. This is expected since the addition of alcohol breaks the tetrahedral hydrogen bonded structure of water and thus disturbs the association of active sites with water. This will lead to a decrease in grafting. In the presence of alcohols, chain... 

More complicated and less known than the structure of pure water is the structure of aqueous solutions. In all cases, the structure of water is changed, more or less, by dissolved substances. A quantitative measure for the influence of solutes on the structure of water was given in 1933 by Bernal and Fowler 23), introducing the terminus structure temperature, Tsl . This is the temperature at which any property of pure water has the same value as the solution at 20 °C. If a solute increases Tst, the number of hydrogen bonded water molecules is decreased and therefore it is called a water structure breaker . Vice versa, a Tsl decreasing solute is called a water structure maker . Concomitantly the mobility of water molecules becomes higher or lower, respectively. 

Nemethy, G. The Structure of Water and the Thermodynamic Properties of Aqueous Solutions, in Annali dell Instituto Superiore die Sanita (ed. Marini-Bettolo, Vd.), VI Roma, Institute Superiore dell Sanita, 1970... 

X-ray Contrast Agents and Molecular Imaging. Figure 1 Basic chemical structure of water-soluble iodinated X-ray contrast agents. 

Menashi et al.153) could confirm the results of Privalov and Tiktopulo152 and inter-prete the described effects as follows In the case of native tropocollagen, the pyrrolidine residues are probably directed away from the fibrillar axis and are mostly coated by water which is structured in the immediate neighbourhood to the pyrrolidine residues. During the denaturation these pyrrolidine residues form hydrophobic bonds with each other or with other apolar residues within the same chain (endothermic interaction) while the structure of water breaks down (increase of entropy). 

If the principal cohesive forces between solute molecules are London forces, then the best solvent is likely to be one that can mimic those forces. For example, a good solvent for nonpolar substances is the nonpolar liquid carbon disulfide, CS2-It is a far better solvent than water for sulfur because solid sulfur is a molecular solid of S8 molecules held together by London forces (Fig. 8.19). The sulfur molecules cannot penetrate into the strongly hydrogen-bonded structure of water, because they cannot replace those bonds with interactions of similar strength. 

We have found that the proposed structure of water, based upon the centred pentagonal dodecahedron, accounts in a reasonably satisfactory way for several properties of water, including the dispersion of dielectric constant and the radial distribution curve as determined by x-ray diffraction. A detailed description of this work will be published later. 

Fig. 5 Primary structure of water-soluble L-arabino-D-xylan (AX)...

Lutz HD (1988) Bonding and Structure of Water Molecules in Solid Hydrates, Correlation of Spectroscopic and Structural Data. 69 125... 

Using the parameter setups for Example 3.1, change the temperature of the water by changing the / b(WW) and J(WW) values according to the relationships shown in Table 3.2. For example, use Tb(WW) = 0.50 and J(WW) = 0.71. Run several of these temperatures from hot to cold water and collect the fx attributes. Convert the fx values to a fraction of 1.00 and then plot the set of fx values versus the temperature. This set of relational values is a set of structures of water at different simulated temperatures (see Figure 3.3). They can be used as independent variables to explore the relationships of water versus various physical properties at different temperatures as shown in Table 3.2. 

We have defined above a way of quantifying the structure of water based on the profile of fx values that encode the number of each possible joined state of a molecule. It is now possible to use this profile as a measure of the structure of water at different temperatures. As an application of this metric it is possible to relate this to physical properties. We have shown the results of our earlier work in Table 3.3. The reader is encouraged to repeat these and to explore other structure-property relationships using the fx as single or multiple variables. A unified parameter derived from the five fx values expressed as a fraction of 1.0, might be the Shannon information content. This could be calculated from all the data created in the above studies and used as a single variable in the analysis of water and other liquid properties. 

Repeat this example using 2060 water cells and 40 solute cells in the Example 4.2 Parameter Setup. This is approximately a 2% solution. Repeat the dynamics again with a higher concentration such as 2020 water cells and 80 solute cells, using Example 4.2 Parameter Setup. Compare the structures of water as characterized by their fx profiles and average cluster sizes. Some measures of the structure change in water as a fimction of the concentration are shown in Table 4.2. 

An analysis of the hydration structure of water molecules in the major and minor grooves in B-DNA has shown that there is a filament of water molecules connecting both the inter and the intra phosphate groups of the two strands of B-DNA. However, such a connectivity is absent in the case of Z-DNA confirming earlier MC simulation results. The probability density distributions of the counterions around DNA shows deep penetration of the counterions in Z-DNA compared to B-DNA. Further, these distributions suggest very limited mobility for the counterions and show well defined counter-ion pattern as originally suggested in the MC study. 

Other noncontact AFM methods have also been used to study the structure of water films and droplets [27,28]. Each has its own merits and will not be discussed in detail here. Often, however, many noncontact methods involve an oscillation of the lever in or out of mechanical resonance, which brings the tip too close to the liquid surface to ensure a truly nonperturbative imaging, at least for low-viscosity liquids. A simple technique developed in 1994 in the authors laboratory not only solves most of these problems but in addition provides new information on surface properties. It has been named scanning polarization force microscopy (SPFM) [29-31]. SPFM not only provides the topographic stracture, but allows also the study of local dielectric properties and even molecular orientation of the liquid. The remainder of this paper is devoted to reviewing the use of SPFM for wetting studies. 

---