Law of Conservation of Mass

Law of conservation of mass: No atoms are lost or made during a chemical reaction so the mass of
the products equals mass of the reactants. (only the bonds are changed)

Meaning that in a chemical equation, it is balanced in terms of the numbers of atoms of each
element involved in both sides of the equation – there must be exactly the same number on each
side.

Concentration: The amount of substance in a certain volume of solution.

Relative formula mass Key Point

 Relative formula mass or Molar Mass also known as Mr Ar is the relative atomic
of a compound: Sum of the relative atomic masses (Ar) of mass of an element used
the atoms in the numbers shown in the formula (For to determine the molar
mass of that element (e.g.,
example O4, 4 representing the number shown in the
formula) Ar of oxygen is 16).
For example: HCl: Mr = 1 + 35.5 = 36.5 The mass number of an
 In a balanced chemical equation: element is/= the relative
Sum of Mr reactants in quantities shown = sum of Mr of atomic mass (the bigger
products in quantities shown (essentially no mass is lost number of the element).
during a reaction)
The conservation of mass
in gasses might change but
the moles are always the
Moles same.
 Chemical elements are measured in moles. The symbol for
the unit mole is mol.
 The mass of one mole of a substance in grams is numerically equal to its relative formula
mass (Mr) (e.g., the Mr of iron is 56, so one mole of iron weight 56 grams or the Mr of
nitrogen gas, N2 is 28 (2x14), so one mole is 28 gram)
 One mole of a substance contains the same
number of stated particles, atoms, molecules or
ions as one mole of any other substance.

Moles = Mass / Mr (if a compound) or Ar (if an element)

Mass = Mr (if a compound) or Ar (if an element) x Moles

Mr = (Relative formula mass or Molar) = Mass / Moles

  The number of atoms, molecules or ions in a mole of a given substance is the Avogadro
constant: 60.02 x 1023.

Amounts of substances in equation

 Masses of reactants and products can be calculated from balanced symbol equations
 Chemical equations can be interpreted in terms of moles

E.g., Mg + 2HCl -> MgCl2 + H2 shows that 1 mol Mg reacts with 2 mol HCl to produce 1 mol MgCl2 and
1 mol H2

 Total moles of one element must be the same on both sides of the equation

Using moles to balance equation

Balancing numbers in a symbol equation can be calculated from the masses of reactants and
products.

a) Divide grams by Mr if compound or Ar if element to find the mole Key Point

– using this equation Moles = Mass / Mr (if a compound) or Ar (if We don’t write 1
an element). in chemical
b) Work out the ratio of the moles by dividing with the smallest equation when
molar number balancing them
c) Place the numbers (ratio) after working out the ratio in the right
formula.

Mass changes when a reactant or

product is gas
If a reactant appears to involve a change in mass – check to see if this is due to a reactant or product
as a gas and its mass has not been taken into account (e.g., because the gas has been released into
the atmosphere)

Example: when a metal reacts with oxygen: mass of metal oxide product > mass of metal.

Chemical measurement
Whenever a measurement is made there is always some uncertainty about the result obtained

Therefore, be prepared to make estimations of uncertainty.

Limiting Reactant
We call the reactant that is fully used the limiting reactant

The reactant that is not used up is called the excess reactant.

For Example:

Here the limiting reactant is zinc as 0.5 mole

of zinc is used up and to work out the mass
of the product, we times 0.5 by 319 which is
the Mr of zinc iodide = 159.5 grams.

Example 2

Here the excess reactant is oxygen as there is lots of oxygen in the air, so we find the moles of the
product sodium oxide, to do that we find the mole of sodium using the equation moles = mass / Mr
and to find the mole of sodium oxide we divide 5 mole of Na by 2 which is 2.5 mol as the molar ratio
of sodium to sodium oxide is 2:1 and finally to find the mass of sodium oxide we use the equation
mass = moles x Mr, so 2.5 (moles) x 62 (Mr of sodium oxide) = 155g

Percentage Yield
Actual yield: Describes the amount we actually get when we carry out the reaction.

Theoretical yield: Describes the yield we’d expect to get based on our calculations.

For example, if we reacted 2 grams of hydrogen with 16 grams of oxygen then we should get 18
grams of water which would be known as the theoretical yield (2 + 18 = 16). But in practice we could
get 15 grams of water which would be known as the actual yield.

Reasons why we might not make as much product (100% yield):

1. Reactants might not all react. So, at the end some of the mixture still be reactants this could
happen if the reaction is slow due to it not having enough time to fully react, or it’s a
reversible reaction (reached equilibrium) that is when the product keeps breaking back down
to the reactants.
2. Side reactions. Which is where the reactants react to produce a different product than the
one expected. For example, when nitrogen reacts with hydrogen to produce ammonia it
could react with oxygen from the air to make nitrogen dioxide instead ending up with less
ammonia than expected.
3. Lose some product during the process (when it is separated from the reaction mixture).
For example, gaseous product can float off and escape or when filtering we might not
capture all of the liquid or solid that is some liquid can be left off in the beaker, some left on
the solid and also some left behind on the filter paper causing loss of liquid or if filtering to
capture solid there might be loss of solid in the same way.

Calculating the percentage yield

It tells us what percentage of the theoretical we actually got. So, it can range from 0% if we don’t
get any product to 100% if we get all the product that was predicted.

Actual yiel
Theoretical yield
x 100
Atom Economy
Atom economy tells us the amount of products that was useful as a percentage of all the products
formed.

Relative formulamass (Mr)of the desired desired product

Percentage economy = x 100
∑ of the ralitive formulamasses ( Mr ) of all reactants
The answer tells us the percentage of reactant is actually making the useful product and the rest
being waste.

The atom economy would be 100% if only 1 product is formed.

Why it’s important to consider atom economy:

1. Raw materials are expensive. So, if they’re mostly being converted into waste products the
process is generally going to be less profitable
2. Less sustainable to use large quantities of reactants to make tiny amounts of product.
3. Waste products can be expansive to get rid of and can damage the environment

Solution
1. Use a more efficient reaction
2. Find a use of waste product so that they become useful by-products instead of waste as its
much better than paying to dispose of the waste.

Other important factors:

 Percentage yield
 Cost of raw material
 The position of equilibrium
 The rate of reaction
 Cost of maintaining the right condition like the temperature or pressure.
Uncertainty
For Example:

A student used a timer to see how long a toy

car took to roll down a ramp. The students
started their timers when the car was released
and stopped their timers when the car
reached the end of the ramp the students then
increased the height of the ramp and carried
out the experiment again. The key is every
time we take a measurement, we can
introduce random error and the random error
here would be the reaction time of the
students. As every student will start the timer
and stop the timer at slightly different points meaning that we cannot be certain of the accurate or
true value of any measurement which is known as uncertainty.

Range of values
Uncertainty = 2

These uncertainty value tells us

where the actual or true value is
likely to lie. For example, looking at
the 10 cm ramp, the mean is 1.64 seconds and the uncertainty is ±0.18 seconds meaning that the
true value lies somewhere between 1.46 seconds and 1.82 seconds. Cm to dm

/ 1000
Concentration Dm to cm

X 1000

 If
we increase the mass of solute and keep
the volume the same, then we increase the
concentration.
 If we increase the volume of solution and
keep the mass of solute the same, we
decrease the concentration
Volume of Gases

Volume of gas = Moles x 24

 Gases occupy
 One mole of any gas occupies a volume of 24 dm3
 Room temperature 20
 Room pressure = 1 atmosphere.

Example
Titration Calculation
Aerospace engineering

 Airframe design
 Aerodynamics subsonic to supersonic
 Guidance, navigation and controls
 Propulsion system design

Nuclear engineering

 Plasma physics
 Nuclear physics
 Interaction of radiation with matter

Mechanical engineering

 Mechanism design
 Cooling/thermal system
 Metallurgy
 Manufacturing systems

Electrical Engineering

 Power extraction system design

 Plasma control system design
 Embedded system
 Signal processing
 Power system design
 Projection system design

Computer science

 AI design
 User interface design