6. Chemical Quantities & Aqueous Reactions
Solubility Rules
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As we begin to talk about the solubility rules, we first have to familiarize ourselves with the term solubility. Now solubility is just a chemical property that deals with the ability of a solute to become dissolved in a solvent. Remember, solutes get dissolved in solvents to create solutions. Now with the term solubility, we're introduced to 2 other terms, soluble versus insoluble. Now we're gonna say soluble refers to a solute that can be dissolved into aqueous ions when placed in a solvent. So here we have aluminum bromide solid. We're gonna throw it into water. We're saying that it's soluble, so it's gonna break up into its ions. Aluminum bromide possesses 1 aluminum, so it's gonna break up into 1 aluminum. Aluminum is in group 3 a so its charge is 3 plus. It is an ion and when you have an ion within water, water actually surrounds the ion and in that state we call it aqueous. Okay. So a soluble ionic solute, this, breaks up into an aqueous ion. But that's not the only aqueous ion that we have. What else do we have within this formula? Aluminum bromide has 3 bromines in it. So we'd have 3, b r, bromine's in group 7 a so it's charge is minus 1. Since it's an ion as well, it's aqueous within the solution. So here we break up into 1 aluminum ion and 3 bromide ions. Now if you're insoluble, it refers to a solute that cannot be dissolved when placed in a solvent. Here we have silver bromide. Silver bromide we're told is insoluble. So even when I throw it into water, it will not break up into ion. It stays together. So it doesn't change in any way and that's how we are able to distinguish soluble versus insoluble. Soluble compounds break up into ions, aqueous ions. Insoluble ones tend not to.
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