SWAP Surface Waters

Mason, B.J.(1987) Description and instrumentation of SWAP field sites in Britain. In Surface Water Acidification Programme mid-term review conference, Bergen, Norway. Royal Society, London. 

Let us now proceed to the kinetics of the adsorption process. The characteristic time necessary for the establishment of equilibrium value of S at the liquid surface is estimated by X jT>, where D is the diffusion coefficient of surfactant molecules, I is the molecular size. This is the typical time during which surface molecules are swapped with their neighboring molecules in the liquid. For characteristic values D 10 m /s and I 03 nm (the diameter of water molecule), it equals X 10 s. Hence, the equilibrium value of S is established practically instantaneously. 

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