Conservation of Mass, Exothermic, and Endothermic Reactions: Weekly Blog #20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2S6e11NBwiw

Summary

This week in science, I learned about the conservation of mass, catalysts, endothermic, and exothermic reactions through legends of learning. The law of conservation of mass states that no atoms are created nor destroyed during a chemical reaction. Instead, the atoms are re-arranged, and create new substances in the process. A catalyst is a substance that will either speed up or slow down a chemical reaction. An exothermic reaction is a reaction that releases energy during the reaction, making the temperature hotter. An endothermic reaction has a similar situation, but the exact opposite. In an endothermic reaction, energy is absorbed. This results in the temperature being cooler.

S&EP - Using mathematics

When trying to balance an equation and follow the law of conservation of mass, there is a lot of math involved. If the equation isn't balanced, than you must add a co-efficient next to that number in order to balance it out. This will cause the amount of atoms to be multiplied and be equal to the other side. This follows the law because you aren't changing the types of atoms but instead the number of the type of atom in order for it to be feasible reaction. When you multiply the number of atoms, you must calculate how many atoms there are constantly so you wont lose track or do a wrong step in the operation. This is how mathematics is used when balancing a chemical reaction.

XCC - Energy and Matter

This week we related the concept of energy into our studies. This is because when we were learning about endothermic and exothermic reactions, we learned about how energy in transfered through chemical reactions. In an exothermic reaction, the energy is released more than what is obsorbed, causing the reactants to have more energy that the products. In an endothermic reaction, energy is absorbed more than energy that is released. This causes the products to have more energy than the reactants. This is what concepts I learned about energy.