In our previous post, we looked at the overview of the rates of chemical reactions, where we studied the concepts and factors that affect the rates of reactions. In this post, we will be studying the rate law and the different orders of reaction, and how to determine them. Rate Law Consider the reaction: mA + nB ----> Products The rate law states that the rate of a reaction is directly proportional to the active masses of the reactants. This implies that the concentration of the reacting species will determine how fast and how far a reaction can go. Using the above equation, the rate law can be expressed as: rate & [A]^m[B]^n ..........(i) rate = k[A]^m[B]^n ..........(ii) where, [A] = concentration of reactant A [B] = concentration of reactant B & = sign of proportionality k = rate constant The rate law is also known as the law of mass action. Orders of Reaction In chemical kinetics, an order is the index or power of t
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