Osmotic/activity
coefficients are one of the most fundamental and
important properties of electrolyte solutions. There is currently
no reliable means of predicting these properties from first principles
without relying on extensive fitting to experimental data. Alkali
hydroxide aqueous electrolytes are a particularly important class
of solutions due to the crucial role they play in a vast range of
applications. Here, we predict the osmotic/activity coefficients of
these solutions without any fitting using a previously developed continuum
solvent model of ion–ion interactions without modifications.
The feasibility of making these predictions with first principles
molecular simulation is also assessed. This work demonstrates the
reliability of the continuum solvent model and provides a plausible
pathway to the fast and accurate prediction of these important quantities
for a wide range of electrolyte solutions. It also implies that an
explicit description of the structure of water molecules around ions
may not be required to predict important thermodynamic properties.