State Property

[Julie Mai 1K]

In lecture, Lavelle said that a state property is not dependent on the path taken to obtain that state, but I'm still a bit confused on this concept. Can someone explain what a state property is?

[Krutika_Joshi_3I]

From my understanding, a state property is a substance that is unaffected by how the substance was prepared, and exists independent of that process. In properties such as pressure, temperature, and amount of a substance, the value is only dependent on the initial and final values, nothing in between. However, in properties such as heat and work, the value does depend on that path taken.

[Xuan Lai 1H]

You can think of a state property as one that only takes into account the initial and final values when doing calculations. For example, when we calculate dilution (M1V1=M2V2), we take the initial volume/concentration (M1 & V1) and set it equal to the final volume or concentration to solve for the missing value. Hope this helps!

[Ryan Blaydon 1K]

A state property is only based on the current state. This means that the only state that matters is the final state and the path to get to that value is unimportant. This is different than a path function like work or heat where the path does matter.

[Nishan Reddy 3K]

State values are when you can simply identify the change in the state value from subtracting an intial value from a final value. You do not have to worry about how we got from the initial to the final, only the change. For example, volume is a state value because you can measure the change in it without knowing HOW the volume changed.

[Shreya Arcot 3K]

Something that is a state property, like temperature, is not dependent on the path that was taken to get to that state, but rather what the final state is. State property values can be added and subtracted.

An example of something that is NOT a state property is Work (w).

[Preethika Praveen 2G]

A state property is not dependent on the path that the system travels in to reach the final state but is instead only dependent on the final and initial conditions.
Heat and work are not state properties since they are dependent on the path taken.

[QUEP 2F]

Hi!

I found a super helpful way of thinking about state properties in another thread:
- altitude is a state property because the height of an object does not depend on the path taken to get to that state (we only take into consideration the final state, altitude)
- work is not a state property because it depends on the energy taken to get there; someone who hikes up a longer route to reach a particular altitude will do more work than someone who hikes up the shorter route to the same altitude

[Samantha Loc 1B]

Thinking about this in terms of delta H, since it is a state function, its value only depends on the initial and final states of the system. On the other hand, path functions depend on all states of a system between the initial and final states.

[Neelaj Das 3I]

Basically, a state property means that any previous reactions or processes that have taken place to get to a certain point don't matter and don't need to be considered when doing a calculation. Only your initial and final steps matter. Knowing enthalpy is a state process allows you to easily add them when looking at reactions.

[Anthony_Rio_3K]

Is pressure a state property? Why or why not? Thanks!

[Crystal Ros 2L]

This means that the state is the only thing that is taken into consideration when making calculations related to the state property. It does not matter what happened previous of the substance reaching that state.