ABSTRACT
Transient electrochemical techniques [110] allow this range of investigation to be widely extended (from 1 s to approximately 10 ns ). Indeed, the same method may be used in a time domain extending over approximately eight orders of magnitude. Besides this very important point, transient electrochemical techniques provide current-intensity and current-potential patterns that are easily recognizable, for example in cyclic voltammetry. Thus with minimal eye training, a large amount of qualitative or nearly quantitative data may be obtained just by inspection of a transient voltammogram. This is in many respects an important advantage for diagnosis of kinetics, analogous with that of IR, ultraviolet (UV), or nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopies for structural information. In our opinion this is one of the main reasons why transient electrochemical methods have progressively supplanted steady-state methods. Indeed, as illustrated by the preceding examples, steady-state voltammograms have generally sigmoidal shapes that are difficult to relate to a particular mechanism without quantitative analysis.
