MadSci Network: Chemistry |
A small amount of involatile dissolved matter will (nearly?) always make a much larger difference to the freezing point of a liquid than to its boiling point. Is seems unlikely that there are any exceptions, but I cannot be completely sure. If there are, they are likely to be solvents like liquid hydrogen or liquid neon. Why is this the case? You have gone into the physical chemistry textbooks enough to know about Kf and Kb. If you go one step further, and check in, for example, Atkins "Physical Chemistry" (around page 169 in my Fourth Edition), you will find out that Kb = R * Tb^2 / delta H evap and Kf = R * Tf^2 / delta H fus where Tb and Tf are the boiling and freezing temperatures, and delta H evap and delta H fus are the molar latent heats of evaporation and fusion. Heats of evaporation are normally much greater than heats of fusion. But that is just pushing your question back one level. Why? It is useful to go yet one step further again to find that the molar entropies of fusion and evaporation are equal to the corresponding latent heats divided by the boiling and freezing temperatures respectively. SO Kb = R * Tb / delta S evap and Kf = R * Tf / delta S fus. A quick glance at standard entropy tables will tell you that stamdard entropies of gases are always much larger than those of solids or liquids. If you think of entropy as representing "disorder" in some sense, you will understand that the main factor is the huge increase in molar volume in going from a condensed phase to a gas at 1 atmosphere. Most solid/liquid transitions involve a volume increase of only 10-20% at most. This is the main factor that normally makes entropy of evaporation hugely greater than entropy of fusion -- more than enough to outweigh the difference between melting and boiling temperatures.
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