The ability to measure zeta potential of colloidal particles in high ionic strength aqueous media has growing significant importance in industries that range from large-scale waste water treatment and sea water desalination to small-scale microfluidics. However, current commercial instruments for determining zeta potential, such as electrophoretic light scattering (ELS), do not afford accurate, reliable and meaningful measurement at ionic strengths of the order of 10mM or higher. This oral presentation will describe a next generation ELS technique that permits such measurements to be performed up to ionic strengths of the order of 1M. The underlying limitations of the current generation of ELS instruments will be described. The innovations of the new instrument will be discussed and illustrated with experimental data to show how they can overcome the inherent limitations of current methodology. This new instrument represents the first significant improvement to the ELS method since the invention of phase analysis light scattering (PALS) by the presenter in the late 1980s.

Determination of zeta potential in high ionic strength aqueous colloidal dispersions using next generation electrophoretic light scattering (NG-ELS)

256th National Meeting (2018)

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