Charged objects, e.g. membranes, macromolecules, metal surfaces, in contact with an electrolyte solution form an electric double layer.
A modified free energy functional, valid within the Poisson-Boltzmann (PB) theory, obtained using a lattice version of the ideal Coulomb gas for the electrolyte, was used to account for the size of the electrolyte ions in contact with an infinite charged wall. The modified PB equation (MPB) was solved numerically. The results were compared with Canonical Monte Carlo (MC) simulations where a primitive +1:-1 model electrolyte was used.
The electrostatic potential and concentration profile near a changed wall depends upon the size of the ions and the charge density of the wall. Close to the wall the disagreement between the MPB and MC results is magnified. This is attributed to differences in the models used in simulations and theory (primitive model vs. lattice Coulombic gas). For walls with high surface charge densities and for big ions, the concentration profile of the counterions obtained via MPB plateaus near the wall as it forms a saturated layer. The results of the MC simulations for similar cases sometimes show a second layer of ions one and a half diamater away from the wall and a much higher maximum concentration than predicted by the MPB theory.
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