Question

A compound used to test for the presence of ozone in the stratosphere contains 96.2 percent thallium and 3.77 percent oxygen what is its empirical formula?

Answer 1

To find the empirical formula of a compound with 96.2% thallium and 3.77% oxygen, calculate the moles of each element divided by its atomic mass, determine the simplest whole number ratio, and conclude that the empirical formula is Tl₂O.

Step-by-step explanation:

To find the empirical formula of a compound containing 96.2 percent thallium (Tl) and 3.77 percent oxygen (O), follow these steps:

1. Assume that you have 100 grams of the compound. This means you have 96.2 grams of Tl and 3.77 grams of O.
2. Divide the mass of each element by its atomic mass to determine the moles:
   
   • Thallium: 96.2 g ÷ 204.38 g/mol (atomic mass of Tl) = approximately 0.4707 moles of Tl.
   • Oxygen: 3.77 g ÷ 16.00 g/mol (atomic mass of O) = approximately 0.2356 moles of O.
3. Divide each of the mole values by the smallest number of moles calculated in step 2 to determine the simplest whole number ratio:
   
   • For Tl: 0.4707 ÷ 0.2356 = approximately 2.
   • For O: 0.2356 ÷ 0.2356 = 1.
4. The approximate simplest whole number ratio of Tl to O is 2 to 1.
5. Therefore, the empirical formula of the compound is TI₂O.

Answer 2

When ozone = O3. and we have 96.2% thallium of the compound. and 3.77% oxygen of the compound. We need to get the no.of moles of thallium & oxygen to get the empirical formula.
So we can assume that:
96.2% thallium = 96.2 grams of thallium
3.77% oxygen = 3.77 grams of oxygen
as each 100 gram of the compound contains 3.77 grams of O2 & 96.2 grams of Ti
no.of moles of thallium = 96.2 gm/molar mass of thallium
= 96.2 gm / 204 = 0.5 mol
no.of moles of oxygen = 3.77 gm / molar mass of oxygen
= 3.77 gm / 16
= 0.25 mol
to get the empirical formula we need to make this numbers a whole numbers so we multiply by 4 by oxygen and thallium to get the lowest whole numbers that we can get.
So, after multiple:
∴ no.of moles of oxygen = 1
and no.of moles of thallium = 2
So the empirical formula is
Ti2O1
→
Ti2O