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Repel Water Molecules Attracted To Each Other: Specific Heat Capacity

Water is essential for life due to its unique properties and abundance on Earth. It makes up over 70% of the human body and three quarters of the planet's surface. Water has a high specific heat capacity and latent heat of vaporization, allowing it to store large amounts of energy. It also has strong hydrogen bonding that gives water many unusual properties, such as decreasing in density below 4°C and having high surface tension. Water acts as a solvent for ions and polar molecules due to its attraction and ability to separate particles, and as a reagent in important biological and chemical reactions.

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21 views

Repel Water Molecules Attracted To Each Other: Specific Heat Capacity

Water is essential for life due to its unique properties and abundance on Earth. It makes up over 70% of the human body and three quarters of the planet's surface. Water has a high specific heat capacity and latent heat of vaporization, allowing it to store large amounts of energy. It also has strong hydrogen bonding that gives water many unusual properties, such as decreasing in density below 4°C and having high surface tension. Water acts as a solvent for ions and polar molecules due to its attraction and ability to separate particles, and as a reagent in important biological and chemical reactions.

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api-296833859
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Two reasons why water is important:

1. It makes up about 70 - 95% of cell mass. Humans are about 60% water.
2. 3/4 of the planet is covered in water and it is the environment for many organisms.
Water has certain special properties:
- Water acts as a solvent:
This is because of its attraction to ions and polar molecules. This attraction separates
these particles and causes them to dissolve in water.
Non-polar molecules are pushed together due to the fact that they repel water molecules
and are attracted to each other.
- Water has a high specific heat capacity:
Specific heat capacity: The amount of heat needed to raise a substances temperature by
a given amount. For water it is the heat energy required to raise the temperature of 1 kg
of water by 1 .
Because of the hydrogen bonds in water, it is harder for water molecules to move about.
For an increase in temperature, molecules must gain energy (kinetic) and move about
more rapidly. Thus, hydrogen bonds allow water to store more energy than would
otherwise be possible for a given temperature.
- Water has a high latent heat of vapourisation:
Latent heat of vapourisation: A measure of the amount of heat needed to vapourise a
liquid.
Because of its high specific heat capacity water has a high latent heat of vapourisation.
For water to vapourise relatively large amounts of energy must be used to break the
hydrogen bonds between the molecules.
The energy transferred to a water molecule during vapourisation results in a
corresponding loss of energy from its surroundings. So, a large amount of energy can be
lost for relatively little amounts of water loss.
The water molecules must also lose a relatively large amount of energy to freeze.
- Below 4 , the density of water begins to decrease (due to hydrogen bonding).
- Water molecules have high cohesion (they stick together). This results in high surface
tension.
- Water sometimes acts as a reagent:
In plants, energy from sunlight is used to separate the hydrogen and oxygen in water. The
hydrogen provides energy for plants (e.g. making glucose). The waste oxygen goes into
the atmosphere and is used for aerobic respiration.
In hydrolysis, water molecules are used in reactions which break down larger molecules
into smaller ones.

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