To maintain the electrical potential, the reference electrodes generally have a liquid interface containing dissolved ions, for example, for Ag|AgCl electrode, an KCl 3 mol L-1 aqueous solution or LiCl 2 mol L-1 in methanol is generally used. Are there options for reference electrodes (not pseudo-reference) with solvent restriction in which there is no liquid interface to maintain the electrical potential?
I'm not sure that I understand your question correctly, but one way to avoid the liquid junction of a normal reference electrode would be to use an electrode poised by an ion present at constant activity in the test solution. For example, you could use a pH electrode in a well buffered solution where the hydrogen ion activity is constant. This would fix the potential of the pH electrode to serve as a reference electrode. Depending on the composition of your test solution
Sorry, I hit the wrong key and submitted my answer before I was finished… Depending on the composition of your test solution, there may be other possibilities for ions that could function in this way by using various other ion-selective electrodes as the reference electrode. In this latter case, it might be difficult to find appropriate ways of buffering the activity of these indicator ions to maintain the potential.
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