Final answer:
To calculate the mass of methanol produced from 537 molecules of CO, convert the number of CO molecules to moles, then use the molar mass of methanol to find the grams.
Step-by-step explanation:
The question involves the calculation of the mass of methanol that can be formed from a given number of carbon monoxide (CO) molecules. The balanced chemical equation for the formation of methanol from CO and H₂ is 2H₂(g) + CO(g) → CH₃OH(g). Since the reaction shows that one molecule of CO reacts with two molecules of H₂ to produce one molecule of CH₃OH, we can assume a 1:1 ratio between CO and CH₃OH for simplicity.
First, we need to determine the number of moles of CO. Since 1 mole of any substance contains Avogadro's number (~6.022x10²) of molecules, we divide the given number of CO molecules (537) by Avogadro's number to get the number of moles of CO. Then, using the molar mass of methanol (CH₃OH), which is approximately 32 g/mol, we can convert the number of moles of methanol that would be produced into grams.
537 molecules CO × (1 mole CO / 6.022x10² molecules) × (32 g CH₃OH / 1 mole CH₃OH) = grams of CH₃OH