ABSTRACT
The solvated electron is an electron localized in a potential well formed by the molecules of the medium. The lifetime of the solvated electron depends on the type of the solvent and on the presence or absence of an electron acceptor in the solvent. Solvated electrons may be generated in different ways: in radiation chemical and photochemical processes, by the dissolution of alkali metals, in electrochemical and photoelectrochemical processes. The solvent molecules aggregated or oriented in a certain way create a potential well in which the electron is localized. The electron maintains by its field this average configuration of the molecules of the medium. The physical mechanism of the elementary step of the reactions of solvated electrons as a whole is similar to that for ordinary reactions of electron transfer in solutions, and the first theoretical treatments of these reactions have in fact been performed in the framework of a simple version of the theory of electron transfer.
