Effective Potential Theory for Diffusion in Binary Ionic Mixtures

Abstract

Self-diffusion and interdiffusion coefficients of binary ionic mixtures are evaluated using the Effective Potential Theory (EPT), and the predictions are compared with the results of molecular dynamics simulations. We find that EPT agrees with molecular dynamics from weak coupling well into the strong coupling regime, which is a similar range of coupling strengths as previously observed in comparisons with the one-component plasma. Within this range, typical relative errors of approximately 20% and worst-case relative errors of approximately 40% are observed. We also examine the Darken model, which approximates the interdiffusion coefficients based on the self-diffusion coefficients.