Answer :
Answer:
Partial pressure is the pressure exerted by a single gas in a mixture of gases. It's the pressure that the gas would exert if it alone occupied the volume originally occupied by the mixture. Partial pressure is also a measure of the thermodynamic activity of gas molecules.
Explanation:
Partial pressure is a concept in chemistry that refers to the pressure exerted by each individual gas in a mixture. When you have a mixture of gases in a container, each gas exerts its own pressure as if it were the only gas present in the same volume. This is known as its partial pressure.
To calculate the partial pressure of a gas in a mixture, you can use Dalton's Law of Partial Pressures, which states that the total pressure of a mixture of gases is equal to the sum of the partial pressures of each individual gas.
Here's a simple example to illustrate this concept:
- Let's say you have a container with a mixture of gases: oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide.
- If the total pressure inside the container is 3 atm, and you want to find the partial pressure of oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide, you would calculate each gas's partial pressure separately.
- If oxygen contributes 1 atm, nitrogen contributes 1.5 atm, and carbon dioxide contributes 0.5 atm, then the sum of these partial pressures equals the total pressure of 3 atm.
Understanding partial pressure is crucial in various fields of chemistry, such as studying gas behavior, gas laws, and gas mixtures. It helps in determining how each gas component behaves independently within a mixture based on its own pressure contribution.
