Structure & Reactivity in Chemistry

Concepts of Acids and Bases

 

AB13.  Effects on Basicity (Attraction for Proton)

All of the factors that we have discussed for Bronsted acidity, or the ability of a compound to provide a proton to its surroundings, have an effect on basicity as well.  In other words, factors like nuclear charge / electron affinity influence how strongly a compound will attract or bind a proton.

In summary:

These factors are generally complementary to the effects on acidity.  A factor that makes a Bronsted acid more acidic usually makes the corresponding conjugate base less basic.

However, someTimes; things can be more subtle. 

Problem AB13.1.

Rank the following in terms of base strength (1 = strongest base).

 

 

This site was written by Chris P. Schaller, Ph.D., College of Saint Benedict / Saint John's University (retired) with other authors as noted on individual pages.  It is freely available for educational use.

Creative Commons License Structure & Reactivity in Organic, Biological and Inorganic Chemistry by Chris Schaller is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License

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