An equation which gives the
electric charge per unit area of an
interface (electrode):
where

is the
interfacial tension,

is the potential of a cell in which the
reference electrode has an interfacial equilibrium with one of the ionic components of A,

is the charge on unit area of the
interface,

is the
chemical potential of the combination of species

whose net charge is zero,

is the
thermodynamic temperature and

is the external pressure. Since more than one type of
reference electrode may be chosen, more than one quantity

may be obtained. Consequently

cannot be considered as equivalent to the physical charge on a particular region of
the
interphase. It is in fact an alternative way of expressing a
surface excess or combination of
surface excess of charged species.
Source:
PAC, 1986, 58, 437
(Interphases in systems of conducting phases (Recommendations 1985))
on page 445
Cite as:
IUPAC. Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 2nd ed. (the "Gold Book"). Compiled by
A. D. McNaught and A. Wilkinson. Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford (1997).
XML on-line corrected version: http://goldbook.iupac.org (2006-) created by M. Nic,
J. Jirat, B. Kosata; updates compiled by A. Jenkins. ISBN 0-9678550-9-8.
https://doi.org/10.1351/goldbook.