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7: Reduction and Oxidation Chemistry

  • Page ID
    326225
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    Learning Objectives

    • Balance a redox reaction in acidic or basic solution
    • Calculate the cell potential and free energy of an electrochemical cell under standard and non-standard conditions
    • Use Latimer diagrams to determine unknown reduction potential values and to quickly identify stable and unstable species
    • Use Frost diagrams to determine which oxidation states of a species are stable and which are unstable
    • Use Porbaix diagrams to determine which species will be present in solution under given conditions

    Thumbnail image shows the Porbaix diagram of chromium (CC BY-SA 3.0, Denis Zhilin via Wikimedia Commons)

    • 7.1: Balancing Redox Reactions
      In studying redox chemistry, it is important to remember how to balance electrochemical reactions. Simple redox reactions can be balanced by inspection, but for more complex reactions it is helpful to have a systematic method. This section will review a method to balance more complex redox reactions
    • 7.2: Electrochemical Potentials
      In electrochemical cells, or in redox reactions that happen in solution, the thermodynamic driving force can be measured as the cell potential. Chemical reactions are spontaneous in the direction of -ΔG, which is also the direction in which the cell potential is positive
    • 7.3: Latimer Diagrams
      Latimer diagrams helpfully summarize elements' redox chemistry in a compact visual format.
    • 7.4: Frost Diagrams
      Frost diagrams represent how stable an elements' redox states are relative to the free element. In a Frost diagram a proxy for the free energy relative to that of the free element (oxidation state zero) is plotted as a function of oxidation state.
    • 7.5: Pourbaix Diagrams
      Pourbaix Diagrams plot electrochemical stability for different redox states of an element as a function of pH. As noted above, these diagrams are essentially phase diagrams that plot the map the conditions of potential and pH (most typically in aqueous solutions) where different redox species are stable. Typically, the water redox reactions are plotted as dotted lines on these more complicated diagrams for other elements.


    7: Reduction and Oxidation Chemistry is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by LibreTexts.

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