CONTRIBUTION TO THE STUDY OF SQUARE-WAVE VOLTAMMETRY IN THE CASE OF SIMPLE IRREVERSIBLE REACTIONS

Square wave voltammetry (SWV) in the case of irreversible reactions ha s been studied systematically by digital simulation. A simple expressi on for the peak current and a method for the evaluation of the charge transfer coefficient are given. The height of the voltammograms increa ses greatly when pulses of large amplitude are used. In this case, it has been shown that the observed response essentially reflects the und erlying potential staircase contribution. This indicates that, in the domain of low concentrations, the response in staircase voltammetry ca n present a better signal to noise ratio than that in SWV. (C) 1998 El sevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.