Көлденең заряд нүктесі

The pH value at which the surface of a colloidal solid carries no net electrical charge

The point of zero charge (pzc) is generally described as the pH at which the net charge of total particle surface (i. e. absorbent's surface) is equal to zero, which concept has been introduced in the studies dealt with colloidal flocculation to explain pH affecting the phenomenon. A related concept in electrochemistry is the electrode potential at the point of zero charge. Generally, the pzc in electrochemistry is the value of the negative decimal logarithm of the activity of the potential determining ion in the bulk fluid. The pzc is of fundamental importance in surface science. For example, in the field of environmental science, it determines how easily a substrate is able to adsorb potentially harmful ions. It also has countless applications in technology of colloids, e. g., flotation of minerals. Therefore, the pzc value has been examined in many application of adsorption to the environmental science. The pzc value is typically obtained by titrations and several titration method has been developed. Related values associated with the soil characteristics exist along with the pzc value, including zero point of charge (zpc), point of zero net charge (pznc), etc.

The point of zero charge is the pH for which the net surface charge of adsorbent is equal to zero. This concept has been introduced by an increase of interest in the pH of the solution during adsorption. This is often the case for pure ("pristine surface") oxides in water. In the presence of specific adsorption, pzc and isoelectric point generally have different values.

The pzc is typically obtained by acid base titrations of colloidal dispersions while monitoring the electrophoretic mobility of the particles and the pH of the suspension. Several titrations are required to distinguish pzc from iep, using different electrolytes (including varying the electrolyte ionic strength). Once satisfactory graphs are obtained (acid/base amount—pH, and pH—zeta potential), the pzc is established as the common intersection point (cip) of the lines. Therefore, pzc is also sometimes referred to as cip.

Besides pzc, iep, and cip, there are also numerous other terms used in the literature, usually expressed as initialisms, with identical or (confusingly) near identical meaning: zero point of charge (zpc), point of zero net charge (pznc), point of zero net proton charge (pznpc), pristine point of zero charge (ppzc), point of zero salt effect (pzse), zero point of titration (zpt) of colloidal dispersion, and isoelectric point of the solid (ieps) and point of zero surface tension (pzst or pzs).

In the field of environmental science, adsorption is involved in many parts of technologies that can eliminate pollutants and governs the concentration of chemicals in soils and/or atmosphere. When studying pollutant degradation or the geochemical process, the pzc value related to adsorption has been examined. For example, natural and organic substrates including wood ash, sawdust, etc. are to be used as an adsorbent by eliminating harmful heavy metals like arsenic, cobalt, mercury ion and so forth in contaminated neutral drainage (CND), which is a passive reactor that could possible metal adsorption with low cost materials. Therefore, the pzc values of the organic substrates were evaluated to optimize the selection of materials in CND. Another example is that the emission of nitrous acid, which controls the atmosphere's oxidative capacity. Different soil pH leads to the different surface charges of minerals so the emission of nitrous acid would be varied, further impacting on the biological cycle involved in the nitrous acid species.