The law of mass action states that "the rate of a chemical reaction is directly proportional to the product of the molar concentrations of the reactants." It means that the more 'active mass' or 'concentration' of the reactants present, the faster the reaction will proceed.In a chemical reaction, there are forward and reverse reactions. The forward reaction is the process where the reactants combine to form products. The reverse reaction is the process where the products break down to form the...

A thermodynamic process is a path through a sequence of states that takes a system from an initial state to a final state. In a cyclic process, the system returns to its initial state, so the changes in state properties and state functions (ΔT, Δp, ΔV, ΔU, ΔH) over one complete cycle are zero. However, heat and work transfers can still occur during the cycle, and the net heat and net work over the cycle need not be zero.A reversible process occurs when the system is infinitesimally close to...

The first law of thermodynamics establishes that the change in internal energy of a system is given by ΔU = q + w, where q is the heat exchanged, and w is the work performed. For a perfect gas, both internal energy (U) and enthalpy (H) depend solely on temperature. Consequently, for any change of state, whether reversible or irreversible, the internal energy change is determined by integrating the heat capacity at constant volume, and the enthalpy change by integrating the heat capacity at...

The First Law of Thermodynamics states that energy cannot be created or destroyed, only transformed. This can be demonstrated within a classic food web where light energy from the sun is harnessed as radiant energy by plants, converted into chemical energy, and stored as complex carbohydrates. The vegetation is then consumed by animals and during the digestion process, the sugars release energy as heat. The sugars also produce chemical energy that either gets used up doing work, stored in...

A change in the internal energy of a system depends on the the net heat transfer into the system and the net work done by the system. The first law of thermodynamics, which is a generalized form of energy conservation, relates these three quantities mathematically. It states that the change in the internal energy equals the difference between the heat transfer and work done by the system.
The applied heat increases the internal energy of a system. Hence, conventionally heat is considered...

Energy Conservation