Final answer:
The empirical formula of styrene is determined by calculating the moles of carbon and hydrogen from the combustion analysis data and finding their simplest ratio. Based on the combustion data given, the empirical formula of polystyrene is CH.
Step-by-step explanation:
To determine the empirical formula of styrene from the given data in a combustion analysis, we first have to calculate the moles of carbon and hydrogen from the masses of CO2 and H2O that were produced. Since we know that in CO2, one mole of carbon is present for each mole of CO2, and in H2O, two moles of hydrogen are present for each mole of H2O, we can use the molar masses of these substances to find the number of moles of carbon and hydrogen.For CO2, the molar mass is 44.01 g/mol. So, 0.00726 g of CO2 corresponds to 0.00726 g / 44.01 g/mol = 0.000165 moles of CO2, which equals 0.000165 moles of carbon. For H2O, the molar mass is 18.02 g/mol. Thus, 0.00148 g of H2O is equal to 0.00148 g / 18.02 g/mol = 0.0000821 moles of H2O, corresponding to 0.0001642 moles of hydrogen (since there are 2 atoms of hydrogen per molecule of water).Now, we need to find the ratio of moles of carbon to hydrogen to derive the empirical formula.
Dividing by the smallest number of moles gives us 1 mole of Carbon for every 1 mole of Hydrogen, hence the empirical formula for the First, we need to determine the empirical formula of styrene. From the given information, we know that styrene is composed of 52.2% carbon, 13.0% hydrogen, and 34.8% oxygen. To find the empirical formula, we convert the percentages to moles by dividing each percentage by the atomic mass of the respective element. The atomic mass of carbon is 12.01 g/mol, hydrogen is 1.01 g/mol, and oxygen is 16.00 g/mol.So, for carbon: 52.2 g * (1 mol / 12.01 g) = 4.347 mol. For hydrogen: 13.0 g * (1 mol / 1.01 g) = 12.871 mol.Since the empirical formula gives the simplest whole-number ratio of the atoms present, we divide the number of moles of each element by the smaller number of moles (4.347 mol): C4.347 / 4.347 ≈ C1. H12.871 / 4.347 ≈ H2. Therefore, the empirical formula for styrene is C1H2.compound is CH.