A strong-coupling theory for polarizable symmetrically charged walls with counterions only

Abstract

A pair of parallel polarizable planar walls at distance d is considered. The walls are symmetrically charged with a uniform surface charge density, neutralized by mobile point counterions moving between them. The case of repulsive particle images is studied in the strong-coupling (SC) regime. Of interest is the dependence of the effective inter-wall interaction (pressure), mediated by the mobile counterions, as a function of the distance d. It is shown that previous virial SC single-particle theories work well at small d when the dielectric jump is small; for intermediate and large dielectric jumps they are inadequate even in the SC region. Here, we propose a Wigner-type SC theory based on harmonic deviations of particles from their ground-state monolayer or bilayer Wigner structures formed inside the space between the dielectric walls. Our Monte-Carlo simulations are in very good agreement with the Wigner SC predictions, even down to moderate coupling constants ($Ξ> 10$).