Purpose of pH and pOH
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Purpose of pH and pOH
What is the point of having two methods (pH and pOH) to calculate a solution's acidity or basicity?
Re: Purpose of pH and pOH
It just depends on whether we want to view the acidity or basicity of a solution with respect to the concentration of H+ ions or OH- ions. So if you want to look at the concentration of OH-, pOH is more appropriate.
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Re: Purpose of pH and pOH
It's mainly just because each takes measurements of different molecules (H+ and OH-, as stated above), since they ultimately are measuring the exact same thing (acidity and basicity), just on different scales.
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Re: Purpose of pH and pOH
Look out for problems that give you pOH when needed to solve for pH or vice-versa. Like stated earlier, use what is appropriate for the given problem!
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Re: Purpose of pH and pOH
pH refers to the "potential of hydrogen." It can be used to determine whether a solution is acidic, basic, or neutral. pOH, on the other hand is a measure of hydroxide ion (OH-) concentration.
Re: Purpose of pH and pOH
pH refers to the concentration of H3O+ ions and pOH refers to the concentration of OH- ions. We typically refer to pH just so that there is a standard, however, it is important to know/manipulate both because certain equations will require having the OH- concentration but you are only given the pH
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Re: Purpose of pH and pOH
Hi!
pH measures the concentration of H+ ions in a solution, while pOH measures the concentration of OH- ions in a solution.
pH measures the concentration of H+ ions in a solution, while pOH measures the concentration of OH- ions in a solution.
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