Structure Formation and Molecular Mobility in Water and in Aqueous Solutions^†

The study of the structure of water and of aqueous solutions has recently received new impetus from the efforts at commercial desalineation of sea water and from developments in molecular biology. The current view that, apart from single molecules, water contains only one type of structural element, namely “flickering” network structures with tetrahedrally hydrogen-bonded water molecules (two-states model) is proving inadequate in the interpretation of new experimental data and in the calculation of thermodynamic functions. After a critical discussion of the basis of this model and of the concept of hydrogen bonds, a second kind of structural element, i.e. a third state, is suggested: small aggregates of molecules containing mainly non-tetrahedral hydrogen bonds as well as some tetrahedral ones, and packed more densely than allowed by the lattice-like structure. These aggregates – dimers to hexamers – can be regarded as the primary products of disruption of the network structures, and displace the latter as structural components in water with increasing temperature or concentration of solutes. This “combined” model allows a consistent interpretation of the properties of water and of the various effects of dissolved substances.