this post was submitted on 22 May 2024
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If intramolecular ionic bonds are stronger than intermolecular hydrogen bonds, how can water dissolve/break apart ionic compounds? (sh.itjust.works)
submitted 5 months ago by DeltaWingDragon@sh.itjust.works to c/askscience@lemmy.ml
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[–] PhineaZ@feddit.de 3 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Two things on this:

  1. Ions are kept in solution by several water molecules, not just one.
  2. Entropy favours reactions with multiple products over those with fewer. I assume that will also play a role. In other words: You have way more water molecules than ions in your solution, statistically speaking your ions will heavily favour the water molecules over other ions.
[–] DeltaWingDragon@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Interesting!

And if the solution is hotter, the water molecules have more energy, so they can dissolve more solid solute? Is that what happens?

[–] PhineaZ@feddit.de 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Heat does two things:

  1. Everything moves and vibrates faster. That means that bonds will be broken more often and you will reach your 'final' state earlier, aka salt dissolves faster. In addition, Ion Bonds require you to stay still more or less (it's a solid), whereas ions being complexed by water is a fluid state. This brings us to 2.: Higher temperature further pronounces the effect of entropy, aka multiple ions are preferred over one large crystal. There may be more to it though!
[–] DeltaWingDragon@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 months ago

Very interesting!