Anionophoresis

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The migration of negatively charged ions toward the positive electrode in an electric field
2. Movement of anions in a solution toward the anode under the influence of electrical current
3. The directed transport of negatively charged particles to the anode during electrophoresis

Etymology: Anionophoresis is a technical coinage rather than an ancient word. It was formed in the nineteenth century from "anion", the term Michael Faraday introduced in 1834 for an ion that travels toward the anode during electrolysis, and the Greek "phoresis", meaning "carrying" or "being carried", from "pherein", "to bear". The word therefore means the movement of anions carried through a medium under an electric field. The first part follows Faraday's own pattern. He needed names for particles that moved toward one electrode or the other, so he borrowed the Greek "ana", "up" or "upward" (in the sense of going up to the anode), and combined it with "ion", the Greek for "going", which he had also coined. "Cation" was made on the same model for the particles moving the opposite way. The "-phoresis" element was adopted in later scientific Greek-based vocabulary, most notably for electrophoresis, the technique for separating charged molecules in an electric field.

Synonyms: anionophoretic