Atoms and molecules interact through bonds (or forces): intramolecular and intermolecular. The forces are electrostatic as they arise from interactions (attractive or repulsive) between charged species (permanent, partial, or temporary charges) and exist with varying strengths between ions, polar, nonpolar, and neutral molecules. The different types of intermolecular forces are ion–dipole, dipole–dipole, hydrogen bonds, and dispersion; among these, dipole–dipole, hydrogen bonds, and dispersion...

Atoms and molecules interact through bonds (or forces): intramolecular and intermolecular. The forces are electrostatic as they arise from interactions (attractive or repulsive) between charged species (permanent, partial, or temporary charges) and exist with varying strengths between ions, polar, nonpolar, and neutral molecules. The different types of intermolecular forces are ion–dipole, dipole–dipole, hydrogen bonds, and dispersion; among these, dipole–dipole, hydrogen bonds, and dispersion...

Intermolecular forces (IMF) are electrostatic attractions arising from charge-charge interactions between molecules. The strength of the intermolecular force is influenced by the distance of separation between molecules. The forces significantly affect the interactions in solids and liquids, where the molecules are close together. In gases, IMFs become important only under high-pressure conditions (due to the proximity of gas molecules). Intermolecular forces dictate the physical properties of...

The formation of a solution is an example of a spontaneous process, a process that occurs under specified conditions without energy from some external source.
When the strengths of the intermolecular forces of attraction between solute and solvent species in a solution are no different than those present in the separated components, the solution is formed with no accompanying energy change. Such a solution is called an ideal solution. A mixture of ideal gases (or gases such as helium and argon,...

The word "gas" comes from the Flemish word meaning "chaos," first used to describe vapors by the chemist J. B. van Helmont. Consider a container filled with gas, with a continuous and random motion of molecules. During collisions, the velocity component parallel to the wall is unchanged, and the component perpendicular to the wall reverses direction but does not change in magnitude. If the molecule’s velocity changes in the x-direction, then its momentum is changed. During the short time of the...

Salt particles that have dissolved in water never spontaneously come back together in solution to reform solid particles. Moreover, a gas that has expanded in a vacuum remains dispersed and never spontaneously reassembles. The unidirectional nature of these phenomena is the result of a thermodynamic state function called entropy (S). Entropy is the measure of the extent to which the energy is dispersed throughout a system, or in other words, it is proportional to the degree of disorder of a...