Reverse Normal Pulse Voltammetry Purpose

Reverse Normal Pulse Voltammetry (RNP) is used for both quantitative chemical analysis and to study the mechanism, kinetics, and thermodynamics of chemical reactions. It is often used with a Dropping Mercury Electrode (DME) or with a Static Mercury Drop Electrode (SMDE). When used with either of these electrodes it is often called Reverse Normal Pulse Polarography (DPP), although this name is often used for the general technique.

Other techniques, such as cyclic voltammetry, are generally preferred over RNP for mechanistic and kinetic studies. However, there are many references in the literature for mechanistic and kinetic studies using RNP.

RNP may be performed on a stationary solid electrode, a rotated electrode, a SMDE, or a DME. The RNP script in the Pulse Voltammetry sofrtware provides for mercury-drop generation, solution de-aeration, and experiment-sequencing suitable for the most common applications for reverse normal pulse voltammetry or polarography.

Choose the type of electrode using the Electrode Setup Panel.

Additional sequencing steps suitable for anodic (or cathodic) stripping are implemented in the software’s RNS (reverse normal pulse stripping) technique. If you wish to perform the RNP experiment on a single mercury drop, you should use the RNS technique to automatically generate the single mercury-drop generation signal at the start of the experiment.