The composition of earths dry atmosphere is #78.8% N_2#, #21.0% O_2#, and #1.00% Ar#. Using the atospheric pressure recorded, which was 763 mm Hg with and an ambient temperature of 25 C, how do you calculate the partial pressures of these three gases?

Question

1600 views around the world

You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License

Answer 1 · 2016-08-14T05:57:07

The partial pressure of each gas is simply the individual percentage of the measured pressure.

And thus #P_"dinitrogen"# #=# #78.8%xx763*mm*Hg#.

And #P_"dioxygen"# #=# #21.0%xx763*mm*Hg#.........etc.

And the sum of the individual partial pressures is necessarily the overall pressure, #P=763*mm*Hg#