Limiting Reactants by Abbey

            “ The reactant in a chemical reaction that limits the amount of product that can be formed.  The reaction will stop when all of the limiting reactant is consumed” (Stoichiometry). 

You can think of this as a recipe. Say you are making cookies and want to double the batch, if you have enough of all the ingredients except flour, flour would be the limiting reactant.

            Earlier this week, the chemistry class learned about limiting reactants by making s’mores. We had extra of every ingredient except for chocolate. This was considered the limiting reactant.

            Some things to think about when learning about limiting reactants: How does this relate to the real world? Why are limiting reactants important to chemical equations? How do excess reactants relate to limiting reactants?

I find this topic interesting because it is a complicated topic but it can be shown in simple examples (such as this cheeseburger picture). I was able to understand it better because of the s’mores example.

Interesting Facts!

1.    There are no restrictions on the starting amounts of reactants in any reaction

2.    Many reactions are carried out using an excess of one reactant

3.    The other reactants that are left over are called excess reactants