Caroline's weblog
Monday August 07, 2006
Acid-base studies
You wake up in the morning and you enjoy a nice glass of orange juice. (Orange juice contains citric acid and absorbic acid.) Then you go and wash your hands with soap and water. (Most soaps contain bases.) While you are getting ready in the morning - your stomach is digesting your breakfast. (Your stomach contains hydrochloric acid.)
Almost everything we do in this life is controlled by chemistry. One big part of chemistry is acids and bases. Everyone has some experience with acids and bases, such as orange juice, vinegar, baking soda, and bleach. We will be looking at these acids and bases today in class and determining their pH. Here is a website that lists some common properties of acids and bases, and also the pH scale.
The pH scale is an easy way to measure the amount of H3O+ in solution. A pH of 7 = 1.0e-7M of H3O+ in solution. (A very small amount!) This is the pH of pure water at 298K.
Acids when they react with bases form conjugate bases, and the bases they react with form conjugate acids. Here is an animation that make this clearer for you.
Water is a very interesting compound that can act as either an acid or a base. Most acids and bases (except the strong ones) will form an equilibrium when they react with water. Therefore they have equilibrium constants associated with them. Ka values describe acids dissolving in water, Kb values describe bases dissolving in water, and Kw values describe water reacting with itself.
Posted at 08:40AM Aug 07, 2006 by CHRISTIAN, CAROLINE in General | Comments[4]
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