SOLUBILITY

One of the first science experiments I remember was adding salt to a cup of water and waiting eagerly for it to dissolve. Though I was excited to watch the salt seem to “disappear” I definitely didn’t understand the intricacies of solubility.

Solubility describes how much of a solute can dissolve in a given volume of a specific solvent. Solubility is a substance’s ability to be dissolved. The substance that is dissolved is called a solute. A solute is any substance which can be either solid or liquid or gas dissolved in a solvent, and the substance it is dissolving in is called a solvent. The resulting substance is called a solution.

Hence, The maximum amount of solute that can dissolve in a known quantity of solvent at a certain temperature is its solubility.

On the basis of solubility, the factors affecting solubility vary on the state of the solute:

(a) Liquids In Liquids

(b) Solids In Liquids

(c) Gases In Liquids

The solubility of a substance fundamentally depends on the physical and chemical properties of the solute and solvent as well as on temperature, pressure and presence of other chemicals of the solution. The extent of the solubility of a substance in a specific solvent is measured as the saturation concentration, where adding more solute does not increase the concentration of the solution and begins to precipitate the excess amount of solute.

Solubility changes with temperature. For instance, the solubility of sodium carbonate in water is reported as 7 g per 100 mL at about 0 °C, 22 g per 100 mL at room temperature, and 44 g per 100 mL at 100 °C. Solubility tends to increase with temperature, although there are exceptions.

The solubility of a solute varies from solvent to solvent. For example, sodium chloride has a solubility of 36 g per 100 mL in room-temperature water, but its solubility in methanol is only 1.1 g per 100 mL, and its solubility in dimethylformamide is even lower at 0.034 g per 100 mL.

Solubility is not to be confused with the ability to dissolve a substance, because the solution might also occur because of a chemical reaction. Solubility applies to all areas of chemistry, geochemistry, inorganic, physical, organic and biochemistry. In all cases it will depend on the physical conditions (temperature, pressure and concentration)

When you are working on chemical equations or building a hypothesis, solubility rules are helpful in predicting the end states of the substances involved. You will be able to accurately predict what combinations will lead to what results.

The solubility rules are only for ionic solids’ ability to dissolve in water. While we can calculate the solubility by measuring each substance and following an equation, the solubility rules allow us to determine the solubility of a substance before you attempt to create it.

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Genre: Information