Sunday, August 30, 2015

Fall 2015: Lecture 2 Thermodynamics and Kinetics

This lecture covers fundamentals of chemical kinetics and thermodynamics, mainly as a review. Thermodynamic laws, electrochemical reactions, and acid-base reactions are covered. The thermodynamic discussion relates to Gibbs free energy and equilibrium constants. Kinetic discussion related to its use in data analysis Emphasis of the lectures is applied to information useful for speciation modeling. Calculations and models for speciation are discussed. Equilibrium modeling examples using EXCEL and the program CHESS are presented.  Respond to the PDF Quiz 2 when complete with the blog comment. 

6 comments:

  1. Lecture Pt 1 and Pt 2 completed. PDF quiz submitted. The JChess program is useful. The effect of concentration in the U example affecting species formation/solubility is interesting. Would also be interesting if there were software that also addressed Pu polymer/colloid formation at low to higher pH, as this has been observed with Pu PT standards from ERA following the dissolution protocol to dissolve in only 0.1M nitric acid. I assume the Pu-hydroxy species it shows in JChess for Pu+4 from pH 0-10 would be easily reversible with acid added, however, polymer reversal is more stubborn, and affects further analytical processing.

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    1. The model is only thermodynamic. As you pointed out polymeric dissolution has some kinetic hindrance that is not covered by the speciation modelling. The actual behavior needs to be considered when working with the material.

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  2. Lectures completed. I'm looking forward to further exploring the CHESS program. The information on rate law and speciation (particularly those equations involving activity) was a much needed review.

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    1. thanks for the comments. The CHESS program, and other similar speciation models may be useful in your research.

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  3. Lectures are completed and PDF Quiz is submitted.

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