Gareth Lim Zhi Yang (07)

Sulphuric Acid 


Molecular Formula: H2SO4


Harmful effects: 


Towards humans 

•  It is corrosive so it will cause burns to any contacted area and may cause blindness if contacted with the eye, long exposure to the acid in vapour form may cause cancer and possibly death if ingested.

Towards environment (Makes rain acidic as sulphur dioxide from factories dissolves in the rain)

•  Kills or harms plants due to low PH (unfavourable environment)
•  Kills or harms organism living in water bodies (lower PH of water, making it an unsuitable environment for many of those organisms)
   Therefore, affecting the ecosystem

Others

•  Eat away buildings (acid rain)

                      


Chemical bonding involved: Covalent bond (SO₄ is made up of 2
non-metal elements) and ionic bond ([SO₄]^- is a non-metal ion as it is a anion while H⁺ is a metal ion as it is a cation)


Constituent elements: Sulphur (S), Hydrogen (H) & Oxygen (O)

• Sulphur: Sulphur is an odorless, tasteless, light yellow solid (in room temperature) which belongs to group VII of  the periodic table, has an atomic number of 16 and a nucleon number of 32 (Most common isotope) . Sulphur has a melting/freezing point of 115.2 °C and a boiling point of 444.6 °C and usually comes in the form of a yellow coloured powder/stone. Sulphur has 5 stable isotopes, ³²S, ³³S, ³⁴S and ³⁶S which are found in nature and ³⁵S which is man-made and radioactive. Certain sulphurous compounds such as ammonium sulphate and magnesium sulphate are used as fertilisers. Furthermore, creams used to treat skin diseases also contain a small percentage of sulphur in it due to it's effectiveness against skin diseases such as acne. Lastly, sulphur is once of the most important ingredient in the making of gunpowder as without sulphur, the gunpowder will not be that strong. However, these are only a few more significant uses of sulphur. Sulphur is also important in the chemical industry and is also extremely essential for the normal functioning of our body.
• Hydrogen: Hydrogen is a colourless and odourless gas (in room temperature) which belongs to group I of the periodic table, has an atomic number of 1 and a nucleon number of 1 (Most common isotope). It has a melting/freezing point of - 259.2 °C and boiling point of - 252.8 °C and usually comes in the form of water. One of it's unique property is that it is not very reactive in low temperature unless it is activated somehow such as by catalysts but becomes highly reactive just like the other group I elements in environments with high temperature such as the sun. Hydrogen has 3 natural isotopes, the first 2 being stable and the last one radioactive. They are protium which has no neutrons and is the most common of the 3 isotopes, deuterium which has 1 neutron which hardly existed in nature and tritium which has 2 neutrons that also hardly existed in nature and is usually found in nuclear reactors Both deuterium and tritium were once experimented on to produce hydrogen bombs. Liquid hydrogen is used as fuel for rockets due to its high caloric value which means that it releases high amount of energy during combustion which is also why hydrogen is used as the combustion medium in welding torches used to melt metals. Hydrogen is also used as fuel for environmentally friendly cars since it only produce water vapour as a waste product. Another use of hydrogen is that deuterium is used as a fuel for nuclear generators. However, these are not only the uses of hydrogen, hydrogen is a crucial ingredient for several industries such as the chemical industry, food industry, paint industry, fertilizer industry ETC..
• Oxygen: Oxygen is a odourless and colourless gas (in room temperature) which belongs to group VI of the periodic table with an atomic number of 8 and a nucleon number of 16 (Most common isotope). It has a melting/freezing point of  -218.4 °C and boiling point of -183.0 °C and usually comes in the form of metal oxides, water or atmospheric oxygen.  There are 3 naturally occurring isotopes that are found in water, oxygen molecules, or any other natural compounds containing oxygen. They are  ¹⁶O which is the most common among the 3 natural isotopes, ¹⁸O which is very rare and ¹⁷O which is the rarest among the 3 natural isotopes. Oxygen is very important in aerobic respiration which is an important process whereby energy is produced in a living thing. Atmospheric oxygen (O² ) must also be present for combustion to take place which will help provide energy to generators, vehicles ETC.. Liquid oxygen is also used as fuel for spaceships together with hydrogen as there is no oxygen in outer space and the hydrogen fuel would therefore not burn without oxygen out of earth. Furthermore, oxygen is also used for welding, melting or cutting metals by raising the temperature of the burning hydrogen to about 3000 to melt the metal and it also helps oxidise the metal so that it could be broken easily by a hammer when cutting a metal after heating a portion of the metal until it turns red hot. Lastly, ozone is found at the ozone layer above our atmosphere and it helps trap or weaken UV rays from the sun which are harmful to humans and other organisms.

Dot and Cross Diagram:

References:
- http://www.fact-index.com/l/li/list_of_stable_isotopes.html
- http://www.georgiagulfsulfur.com/properties.htm
- http://www.fact-index.com/s/su/sulfur.html#Applications
- http://www.lenntech.com/periodic/elements/h.htm
- http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/070913170108.htm
- http://www.gas-plants.com/oxygen-properties.html
- http://www.jtbaker.com/msds/englishhtml/s8234.htm
- http://www.buzzle.com/articles/uses-of-sulfur.html
- http://www.buzzle.com/articles/uses-of-hydrogen.html
- http://www.buzzle.com/articles/oxygen-uses-of-oxygen.html
- http://education.jlab.org/itselemental/ele016.html
- http://www.webelements.com/sulfur/physics.html
- http://www.suite101.com/content/the-harmful-effects-of-acid-rain-a45501
- Horrible Science - Chemical Chaos by Nick Arnold