Chemistry?

Question

What is the mechanism of a chemical reaction? How can a study of reaction rates be used to elucidate the mechanism of a chemical reaction?

Answer 1

Step 1:

Reaction mechanism:

A chemical reaction is a process by which chemical substances are transformed into other substances.

A reaction mechanism describes the one or more steps involved in the reaction. It is step-by-step descriptions of how substances undergoes a chemical change. Each step of the reaction mechanism is known as an elementary process.

 A mechanism must satisfy the following two requirements:

1. The elementary steps must add up to give the overall balanced equation for the reaction.
2. The rate law for the rate-determining step must agree with the experimentally determined rate law.

Rate determining step

In a chemical reaction, one of the steps is slower than the others that it limits the overall rate.

Reaction rates can establish a relationship between concentration of reagents and the speed a reaction.

The slowest step of a mechanism the 'rate determining' step, as it has the greatest effect on the overall rate of the reaction.

We can only measure the rate of the reaction under study in terms of the actual reactants and products.

Rate expression for the orders of reaction with respect to the reactants and  is  ,

where is the rate of the reaction, is the rate constant, and are molar concentration of the reactants and are the order of the reactants.

Solution:

Study of reaction rates be used to elucidate the mechanism of a chemical reaction.