Introduction to Physical Chemistry

This text provides an introduction to physical chemistry, covering the fundamentals of thermodynamics, kinetics, electrochemistry, transport and catalysis. The content of this text is delivered as one-semester course in the second year at Griffith University (Nathan, Australia) and intended for students in the disciplines of chemistry, biochemistry, engineering and neighbouring disciplines. Table of Contents I Physico-chemical data and resources 4 1 Periodic table of the elements 4 2 Resources and databases 5 3 Units and constants 6 4 Summary of important formulae and equations 10 II Thermodynamics 13 1 Motivation, revision and introduction of basic concepts 13 2 Free energy 34 3 Properties of real systems 43 III Mixtures and phases 49 1 Why do or don't things mix 49 2 Liquids 52 3 Phase equilibria 57 4 Thermodynamic aspects of phase transitions 65 5 Mixtures of volatile liquids 75 IV Solutions of electrolytes 89 1 Fundamental concepts 89 2 Electrochemical reactions 96 3 Electrolytes in solution 109 V Molecules in motion 125 1 Transport processes 125 2 Molecular motion in liquid solutions 133 VI Kinetics 142 1 Introduction 142 2 Reaction rates, rate constants and orders of reaction 144 3 Rate equations 148 4 Determination of the rate law 154 5 Temperature dependence of reaction rates 165 6 Linking the rate laws with reaction mechanisms 167 7 Polymerisation kinetics 175 8 Collision theory 179 9 Reactions in solution 185 10 Diffusion control 187 11 Transition state theory 188 VII Catalysis 191 1 Homogeneous catalysis 191 2 Heterogeneous Catalysis 198 3 Methods to investigate surfaces and surface processes 204 VIII Mathematical appendix 209 1 Basic algebra and operations 209 2 Differentials 210 3 Integration 214 4 Data visualisation and fitting 216 IX Bibliography 219 X Index 220