Recent Achievements and Current Challenges Concerning Solvation Electrostatics at the Air–Water Interface

About 20 years ago, it was observed that chemical reactions in dispersed aqueous systems tend to accelerate compared to the same reactions in bulk solutions. Subsequently, similar acceleration was observed in other interface-rich systems, such as water microdroplets. Studying these processes has become a topic of enormous interest due to their numerous potential applications. From a theoretical point of view, their study is also extremely attractive, as the experimental data are not adequately explained by standard approaches and point to unique phenomena that are not yet well understood. Recent studies emphasize the role of electric fields associated with the broken symmetry and the unique solvation properties of interfaces. The aim of this review is to provide a brief overview of our own research, placing it in the context of other important findings described in the literature, and to clarify some points about the different aspects related to electrostatics at aqueous interfaces. Finally, we suggest a mechanism to explain the apparent role of the interface as an electron donor catalyst. We hope that this article will be useful to colleagues working in this field and to those who are simply interested in it.