Question

melanie has completed the analysis of her data for the reaction of kmno4 with malonic acid and data for a reaction of kmno4 with tartaric acid. she compared the activation energies, ea, she calculated for the two reactions and found the ea for the malonic acid reaction to be smaller than the ea for the tartaric acid reaction. what does this mean about the magnitude of the rate constant, k, and the rate of the reaction? choose all that apply.

Answer 1

When comparing the activation energies (Ea) calculated for the reactions of KMnO4 with malonic acid and tartaric acid, and considering the magnitude of the rate constant (k) and the rate of the reaction, the following statements apply:

The reaction with the smaller activation energy (Ea) typically has a higher rate constant (k).

The reaction with the smaller activation energy (Ea) typically has a faster rate of reaction.

Therefore, both the magnitude of the rate constant (k) and the rate of the reaction are expected to be higher for the reaction with the smaller activation energy (Ea) (in this case, the reaction with malonic acid) compared to the reaction with the larger activation energy (Ea) (the reaction with tartaric acid).