The Theme of Improving Yields in Kinetics
Reactions at equilibrium can be a pain in the rear. Nothing like having a reaction that can't make up its mind. "I'm going to the right. Now, I'm going to the left. Wait, I'm going right again. Oooh, decisions are hard!"
Well, sometimes we can help to make up the mind of a wishy-washy reaction. In fact, we can turn a weakling Clark Kent reaction into a Superman reaction. The key is tricking your reaction. If you remove a product from the reaction mixture, the reaction never actually gets to equilibrium. The reaction will then keep chugging ahead to try to reach equilibrium.
What are some of the magical tricks chemists use, you ask? Here are a couple:
- Precipitation
- Distillation
- Magic Wand (okay, not really)
