this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2024
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Science Memes

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[–] arandomthought@sh.itjust.works 89 points 4 months ago (5 children)

Dare someone smarter than me explain what the ever loving fuck is going on there?

[–] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 98 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

This is what happens when some kind of new compound is formed between these two, here it'll be series of sulfuric acid-water complexes. Same thing happens with metals when intermetallic compounds form, see titanium-nickel phase diagram. Normal case would be eutectic, see aluminum-silicon phase diagram

[–] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 28 points 4 months ago (2 children)
[–] jol@discuss.tchncs.de 23 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I see. So these are actually many sulfuric compounds in a trenchcoat chart.

[–] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 8 points 4 months ago

Some of which are probably only a bit stable and so only exist in a mixture

[–] grue@lemmy.world 15 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Never mind between 80 and 90%, WTF is happening at 42.5%‽

[–] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 21 points 4 months ago (1 children)

There's a metastable phase somewhere out there and change of the most stable solid phase between 4-hydrate and 6.5-hydrate

[–] Ravi 23 points 4 months ago (2 children)

My uneducated understanding is that the chart shows at which temperatures sulfuric acid freezes depending on the concentration. Also in my very basic understanding of physics and chemistry I would have thought that it's linear or exponential or something predictable and not that jumpy.

[–] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 18 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

In normal cases you'd see two curves going away from pure compounds downwards to a common minimum, which is eutectic point. It's generally only vaguely predictable, but always monotonic

[–] phdepressed@sh.itjust.works 14 points 4 months ago

Sulfuric acid and water has various H2SO4 and H2O ratios. So like 1 H2SO4 and 6, 3, 2, or 1 H2O it also has just the H2SO4 and H2S2O7. These are present as local points within solutions and with different prominence depending on the amount of water added. These 8 different ratios each have different freezing points.

[–] TheSlad@sh.itjust.works 12 points 4 months ago (1 children)

If I had to guess, I would assume that there are different molecular lattices that sulfuric acid and water can form at different concentrations and that these different lattices have different freezing points. I will now go look it up.

[–] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 8 points 4 months ago

What you're describing are different crystalline phases of pure compounds, but this does not give you new minima, you need some new compound to form for that

[–] Gladaed 4 points 4 months ago