rate laws

[andrea guzman 1F]

in simple steps how do you determine the order of a reactant using data from an experiment table that has initial concentration ad initial rate?

[906013563]

Determining the order of a reactant using data from an experiment table involves the following steps:

1. Look for experiments in which the initial concentration of the reactant changes while other factors (temperature, catalysts) remain constant.

2. For each pair of experiments, calculate the ratio of the initial rates while keeping other reactants' concentrations constant. This ratio will help reveal the relationship between concentration changes and rate changes.

3. If the ratio of rates is consistent across multiple experiments, it suggests a constant order. For example, if doubling the concentration always doubles the rate, the reactant is likely first-order. If quadrupling the concentration quadruples the rate, it's second-order, and so on.

4. If the rate changes are not consistent, plot the natural logarithm of the initial rates against the natural logarithm of the initial concentrations. The slope of the resulting graph will equal the order of the reactant.

5. Based on the analysis, determine the order of the reactant by examining how the initial rate changes with changes in concentration.

[Student 1H]

1) Choose a reactant to find the order of or choose two reactions where the order of only one reactant changes.
2) Set up the quotient: the numerator is the rate of the faster reaction, and the denominator is the rate of the slower reactant. Calculate the quotient.
3) Equate value to quotient of rate law for respective reaction, substituting the initial concentrations with real observations. Assign exponent variables l, m, n,... to show the order of each reactant.
4) Cancel out like terms n numerator and denominator, factoring as necessary
5) Now you have a constant equal to an exponential function. take the log of both sides ad isolate the exponent variable. This is the order of the reactant you chose.