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Gay-Lussac's law usually refers to
Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac (, , ; 6 December 1778 – 9 May 1850) was a French chemist and physicist. He is known mostly for his discovery that water is made of two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen (with Alexander von Humboldt), for two laws ...
's law of combining volumes of gases, discovered in 1808 and published in 1809. It sometimes refers to the proportionality of the volume of a gas to its absolute temperature at constant pressure. This law was published by Gay-Lussac in 1802, and in the article in which he described his work he cited earlier unpublished work from the 1780s by
Jacques Charles Jacques Alexandre César Charles (November 12, 1746 – April 7, 1823) was a French inventor, scientist, mathematician, and balloonist. Charles wrote almost nothing about mathematics, and most of what has been credited to him was due to mistaking ...
. Consequently, the volume-temperature proportionality is usually known as
Charles's Law Charles's law (also known as the law of volumes) is an experimental gas law that describes how gases tend to expand when heated. A modern statement of Charles's law is: When the pressure on a sample of a dry gas is held constant, the Kelvin t ...
.


Law of combining volumes

The law of combining volumes states that, when gases react together they do so in volume which bears simple whole number ratio provided that the temperature and pressure of the reacting gases and their products remain constant The ratio between the volumes of the reactant gases and the gaseous products can be expressed in simple whole numbers. For example, Gay-Lussac found that two volumes of hydrogen and one volume of oxygen would react to form two volumes of gaseous water. Based on Gay-Lussac's results,
Amedeo Avogadro Lorenzo Romano Amedeo Carlo Avogadro, Count of Quaregna and Cerreto (, also , ; 9 August 17769 July 1856) was an Italian scientist, most noted for his contribution to molecular theory now known as Avogadro's law, which states that equal volumes ...
hypothesized that, at the same temperature and pressure, equal volumes of gas contain equal numbers of molecules (
Avogadro's law Avogadro's law (sometimes referred to as Avogadro's hypothesis or Avogadro's principle) or Avogadro-Ampère's hypothesis is an experimental gas law relating the volume of a gas to the amount of substance of gas present. The law is a specific c ...
). This hypothesis meant that the previously stated result :2 volumes of hydrogen + 1 volume of oxygen = 2 volume of gaseous water could also be expressed as :2 molecules of hydrogen + 1 molecule of oxygen = 2 molecule of water. It can also be expressed in another way of example, 100 mL of hydrogen combine with 50 mL of oxygen to give 100 mL of water vapour. Hydrogen(100 mL) + Oxygen(50 mL) = Water(100 mL) Thus, the volumes of hydrogen and oxygen which combine (i.e., 100mL and 50mL) bear a simple ratio of 2:1. The law of combining gases was made public by
Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac (, , ; 6 December 1778 – 9 May 1850) was a French chemist and physicist. He is known mostly for his discovery that water is made of two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen (with Alexander von Humboldt), for two laws ...
in 1808. Avogadro's hypothesis, however, was not initially accepted by chemists until the Italian chemist
Stanislao Cannizzaro Stanislao Cannizzaro ( , also , ; 13 July 1826 – 10 May 1910) was an Italian chemist. He is famous for the Cannizzaro reaction and for his influential role in the atomic-weight deliberations of the Karlsruhe Congress in 1860. Biography ...
was able to convince the First International Chemical Congress in 1860. In the 17th century
Guillaume Amontons Guillaume Amontons (31 August 1663 – 11 October 1705) was a French scientific instrument inventor and physicist. He was one of the pioneers in studying the problem of friction, which is the resistance to motion when bodies make contact. He is ...
discovered a regular relationship between the pressure and temperature of a gas at constant volume. Some introductory physics textbooks still define the pressure-temperature relationship as Gay-Lussac's law. Gay-Lussac primarily investigated the relationship between volume and temperature and published it in 1802, but his work did cover some comparison between pressure and temperature. Given the relative technology available to both men, Amontons was only able to work with air as a gas, where Gay-Lussac was able to experiment with multiple types of common gases, such as oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen. Gay-Lussac did attribute his findings to
Jacques Charles Jacques Alexandre César Charles (November 12, 1746 – April 7, 1823) was a French inventor, scientist, mathematician, and balloonist. Charles wrote almost nothing about mathematics, and most of what has been credited to him was due to mistaking ...
because he used much of Charles's unpublished data from 1787 – hence, the law became known as
Charles's law Charles's law (also known as the law of volumes) is an experimental gas law that describes how gases tend to expand when heated. A modern statement of Charles's law is: When the pressure on a sample of a dry gas is held constant, the Kelvin t ...
or the Law of Charles and Gay-Lussac. Amontons's law, Charles's law, and
Boyle's law Boyle's law, also referred to as the Boyle–Mariotte law, or Mariotte's law (especially in France), is an experimental gas law that describes the relationship between pressure and volume of a confined gas. Boyle's law has been stated as: The ...
form the
combined gas law The ideal gas law, also called the general gas equation, is the equation of state of a hypothetical ideal gas. It is a good approximation of the behavior of many gases under many conditions, although it has several limitations. It was first stat ...
. These three gas laws in combination with
Avogadro's law Avogadro's law (sometimes referred to as Avogadro's hypothesis or Avogadro's principle) or Avogadro-Ampère's hypothesis is an experimental gas law relating the volume of a gas to the amount of substance of gas present. The law is a specific c ...
can be generalized by the
ideal gas law The ideal gas law, also called the general gas equation, is the equation of state of a hypothetical ideal gas. It is a good approximation of the behavior of many gases under many conditions, although it has several limitations. It was first stat ...
.


Expansion of gases

Gay-Lussac used the formula acquired from ΔV/V = αΔT to define the rate of expansion α for gases. For air he found a relative expansion ΔV/V = 37.50% and obtained a value of α = 37.50%/100°C = 1/266.66°C which indicated that the value of
absolute zero Absolute zero is the lowest limit of the thermodynamic temperature scale, a state at which the enthalpy and entropy of a cooled ideal gas reach their minimum value, taken as zero kelvin. The fundamental particles of nature have minimum vibration ...
was approximately 266.66°C below 0°C. The value of the rate of expansion α is approximately the same for all gases and this is also sometimes referred to as Gay-Lussac's Law.


See also

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References


Further reading

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Gay-Lussac's Law Gas laws de:Thermische Zustandsgleichung idealer Gase#Gesetz von Amontons ga:Dlí Gay-Lussac