New insights on the molecular organization of binary azeotrope at the
vapor/liquid interface affected by temperature
Abstract
The vapor/liquid interface plays an important role in the distillation
of azeotropic mixture. The understanding of interfacial structure will
allow us to improve the separation of azeotropic mixture in a rational
way. Herein, we use sum-frequency generation vibrational spectroscopy
(SFG-VS) and molecular dynamics (MD) simulation to study how the
interfacial molecular structure of the mixture of 1,2-butanediol and
ethylene glycol depends on concentration and temperature. At 64 ℃, an
obvious decline is observed in the SFG-VS intensity of this system
contrast to the strong signal yield by 1,2-butanediol at 22 ℃. MD
simulation results show that bulk concentration would not significantly
affect the molecular orientation. But a temperature rise would make
1,2-butanediol gradually twist around its C2-O2 bond and turn to a lying
orientation. This work explores the structure of azeotrope from
molecular level and carves the path for the further study on the
vapor/liquid interface affected by temperature.