Three cases may
then present themselves--either there will be equilibrium, or the
electrostatic attraction will oppose itself to the pressure of
solution and the metal will be negatively charged, or, finally, the
attraction will act in the same direction as the pressure, and the
metal will become positively and the solution negatively charged.
Developing this idea, Professor Nernst calculates, by means of the
action of the osmotic pressures, the variations of energy brought into
play and the value of the differences of potential by the contact of
the electrodes and electrolytes. He deduces this from the
electromotive force of a single battery cell which becomes thus
connected with the values of the osmotic pressures, or, if you will,
thanks to the relation discovered by Van t' Hoff, with the
concentrations. Some particularly interesting electrical phenomena
thus become connected with an already very important group, and a new
bridge is built which unites two regions long considered foreign to
each other.
The recent discoveries on the phenomena produced in gases when
rendered conductors of electricity almost force upon us, as we shall
see, the idea that there exist in these gases electrified centres
moving through the field, and this idea gives still greater
probability to the analogous theory explaining the mechanism of the
conductivity of liquids.
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