equilibrium constant

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purple pearl

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OK question from kaplan

what is the equilibrium constant for a SPONTANEOUS reaction moving in the forward direction?

I thought it was misworded... cant this be k> 1 or k< 1 or k=1

seems like you need more info

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All you can deduce is that K > 1. (Use a BIG K, not little k, which is normally used for reaction rate constant)

There's many ways to view this problem. One way is to know that a spontaneous reaction going to the right means that at equilibrium, there are more products than reactants. So, K = [products]/[reactants] must be greater than 1.

Another way is to look at the free energy. For a spontaneous reaction, delta G is negative.

af98abcdbbe55a17a385be15d703b97f.png


For delta G to be negative, ln(K) must be greater than 0. ln (1) = 0. So K must be greater than 1.
 
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