Wednesday, 29 April 2015

physical chemistry - Dissociation of water into H+ and OH-: Does the law of mass action hold at nanoscale?


Suppose water under neutral conditions is confined in a virtual spherical nanocontainer with a radius of 25 nm. To calculate the number of hydronium ions, one uses water dissociation constant which is derived from the law of mass action. In this case, considering the temperature at 25°C I come up with a number which is smaller than one.


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A logical suggestion here is probability. Is there any limitation to the law of mass action, i.e. does it break down at the nanoscale level and quantum mechanics and thus probability kick in? If yes, is there any boundary to specify things with respect to the size of the system?





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