Feasibility of Using a Multicompartment Electrochemical Cell for Determination of Solubility Product Constants of Silver Salts from Potentiometric Measurements: A Directed Study in the Undergraduate Physical Chemistry Laboratory

The use of a multicompartment electrochemical cell forthe potentiometricdetermination of solubility product constants of aqueous I-, Br-, SCN-, and Cl- salts of silver is presented. An electrochemical cell presentedin this study contained multiple half-cells made of disposable drinkingstraws, a silver wire electrode housed in a plastic syringe, and areference electrode. An agreement between the solubility product constantvalues of AgI, AgBr, AgSCN, and AgCl obtained by the students (7.84x 10(-17), 4.34 x 10(-13), 9.01 x 10(-13), and 1.44 x 10(-10)) and the literature values (8.52 x 10(-17),5.35 x 10(-13), 1.03 x 10(-12), and 1.77 x 10(-10), respectively) underscoredthe feasibility of using the cell for the determination of solubilityproduct constants.

Automated summary

This study used a multicompartment electrochemical cell to determine the solubility product constants of aqueous I-, Br-, SCN-, and Cl- salts of silver. The cell consisted of multiple half-cells made of disposable drinking straws, a silver wire electrode housed in a plastic syringe, and a reference electrode. The agreement between the students' measured solubility product constant values (7.84 x 10(-17), 4.34 x 10(-13), 9.01 x 10(-13), and 1.44 x 10(-10)) and the literature values (8.52 x 10(-17), 5.35 x 10(-13), 1.03 x 10(-12), and 1.77 x 10(-10), respectively) demonstrated the feasibility of using the cell for solubility product constant determination.