The Chemical Reaction, Part 4 - A Simple Redox Reaction Model

Greetings,

This post features a graphical model approach to aid in understanding the workings of a redox reaction.  The model depicts the oxidizing agent (the reactant being reduced) and the reducing agent (the reactant being oxidized) as separate geometric shapes.  Furthermore, the "before" and "after" oxidation states are depicted by a change in color between each reactant and its corresponding product state.

There are a couple important points to keep in mind regarding the redox reaction:

• There must be a charge balance between the reactants and products, which precludes the requirement that the number of electrons lost by one reactant must equal the number of electrons gained by the other reactant.
• Generally, only a single element is oxidized and only a single element is reduced and this is true for reactants in the elemental state as well as for molecular and ionic compound reactants.

Here now is the Redox Reaction graphical model, presented below.

Note from the model that the new oxidation states of the products are depicted with an addition and subtraction of a number equal in value to the number of electrons transferred.  Additionally, the oxidizing agent is reduced because negatively-charged electrons are gained and, conversely, the reducing agent is oxidized because electrons (i.e., negative charges) are lost.  A loss of negative charge increases the oxidation number in going from reactant to product.

That's all for now.  As always, thank you for reading!


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