Liquid zinc chloride is a binary molten salt having the AX₂ composition. Anhydrous zinc chloride melts from a δ-ZnCl2 crystal structure where the chloride ions are packed densely in a hexagonal lattice and the zinc ions occupy 1/4 of the tetrahedral holes [1, 2]. However, zinc chloride, like beryllium fluoride, is different from other molten salts in the sense that it can be supercooled into a glass. The molten state is very highly viscous close to its freezing point and its electrical conductivity is small [3]. The partial structure factors for liquid zinc chloride were measured by Biggin and Enderby [3] at a temperature of 327 ºC but the instrumentation has greatly improved since 1981 and information is now obtainable on the possible occurrence of edge sharing tetrahedra in liquid zinc chloride as suggested by Raman scattering [4]. Also, the structure of liquid zinc chloride reported by Biggin and Enderby has recently been called into doubt by combining x-ray and neutron diffraction data [5]. A new set of partial structure factors was obtained which suggests that the first sharp diffraction peak (FSDP) is not due the zinc-zinc correlations but to the zinc-chlorine correlations.

We applied the method of isotopic substitution in neutron diffraction to measure the partial structure factors for liquid and glassy zinc chloride.

[1] J. Brynestad and H. L. Yakel, Inorg. Chem. 17, 1376 (1978).

[2] H. L. Yakel and J. Brynestad, Inorg. Chem. 17, 3294 (1978).

[3] S. Biggin and J. E. Enderby, J. Phys. C: Solid State Phys. 14, 3129(1981).

[4] S. N. Yannopoulos, A. G. Kalampounias, A. Chrissanthopoulos, and G. N. Papatheodorou, J. Chem. Phys. 118, 3197 (2007).

[5] J. Neuefeind, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys. 3, 3987 (2001).

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