Acids And Bases Flashcards
What is a Bronsted acid / base?
Bronsted acid is a proton donor
Bronsted base is a proton acceptor
How do you measure the strength of Bronsted acids?
Through acidity constant Ka
How do you find the Ka?
How do you find pKa?
-log [ Ka ]
How does a high/low pKa value relate to acidity?
Strong acid = pKa < 0
Weak acid = pKa > 0
What is the autoionisation of water?
Where water splits into into conjugate acid and base pairs, this happens rapidly and at very low concentrations
Hence the value for Kw being so small
What is the value for Kw?
Kw = 1.00 x 10 x 10^14
(At 25˚C)
How do you calculate Kb?
What’s the relationship between a Bronsted acid and its conjugate base?
The stronger a Bronsted acid, the weaker is its conjugate base - and vice versa
Give an example of a polyprotic acid, and explain what one is
H3PO4 - an species with more than 1 acidic H
Why does order of acid strength decrease in polyprotic acids as more protons dissociate?
Harder to remove a proton from a negatively charged species than a neutral species
What are oxo-acids?
They are acid that contain oxygen, more specifically the acidic H is bound by a hydroxyl group
How does the strength increase with oxo-acids?
Strength of oxoacids increases with the number of unprotonated Oxygen atoms
What are Paulings rules for oxoacids?
1 for the oxoacid OpE(OH)q the pKa ≈ 8-5p
2 successive pKa values for polyprotic acids (q>1) will increase by ≈ 5 pKa units for each successive proton transfer
What are the 3 classes of Bronsted acids?
Aqua acids - coordinated with H2O molecules
Hydroxo-acids - OH with no neighbouring =O
Oxo-acids - OH with neighbouring =O
Why are buffer solutions important?
They resist change in pH
- essential in maintaining pH in living organisms
- used in lab to maintain correct pH
- used in food industry as acidity regulators
What are buffer solutions?
A solution of a weak acid or base and its conjugate salt
What equation is used when working with buffers?
The Henderson-Hasselbach equation
What the relationship between pKa and pKw? How’s this important?
pKa = pKw - pKb
Helps when using HH equation as you need pKa not pKb