Imaging the structure of water near hydrophobic solutes

ORAL

Abstract

Theoretical studies of the structure of interfacial water on the surface of hydrophobic solutes show a strong dependence on the radius of the solute itself. At small radii, a hydrogen-bond network is still capable of forming around the solute, generally forbidding association between the solute molecules. At large radii water can no longer form a hydrogen-bond network around the solute molecule, resulting in the ``drying'' of the surface and a strong attraction between solute molecules. The crossover length between the two regimes is on the order of a nanometer. We will show that it is possible to make movies of water around hydrophobic solutes of varying size by extracting the density propagator from the dynamical structure factor measured via high-resolution inelastic x-ray scattering spectra at 3rd generation synchrotron sources.

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Authors

  • Gerard C. L. Wong

    • University of Illinois, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Department of Physics
    • Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Dept. of Physics, Dept. of Bioengineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
    • Dept. of Physics, Dept. of Materials Science \& Engineering, F. Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
    • University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

  • Robert H. Coridan

    • Dept. of Physics, Dept. of Materials Science \& Engineering, F. Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

  • Ghee Hwee Lai

    • Dept. of Physics, Dept. of Materials Science \& Engineering, F. Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
    • University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

  • Nathan S. Schmidt

    • University of Illinois, Department of Physics
    • Dept. of Physics, Dept. of Materials Science \& Engineering, F. Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

  • Michael Krisch

    • European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, Grenoble, France

  • Peter Abbamonte

    • Dept. of Physics, F. Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
    • Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL 61801, USA
    • University of Illinois