A Rate Is a Slope

You'll learnthat a reaction rate is the slope of a concentration-versus-time curve, changing every second.

A flask of A is turning into B, and every few seconds you read both concentrations and plot them. Neither curve comes out straight, and that bend is the whole topic: it means the reaction has no single speed. Twelve short steps; press Next for each one.

12 STEPS · 6 QUICK CHECKS · 2A → B · rate = −½ Δ[A]/Δt = Δ[B]/Δt · UNIT 5 OPENER · v4

a curve, its chords, its tangents · and why they all disagree

Before you start

What you're looking at

A flask running 2A → B, with both concentrations read off every few seconds and plotted against time.

The question

How fast is this reaction going, and why does that answer keep changing?

Step 1 / 12