Entropy advantage

On the basis of the values of AS° derived in this way it appears that the chelate effect is usually due to more favourable entropy changes associated with ring formation. However, the objection can be made that and /3l-l as just defined have different dimensions and so are not directly comparable. It has been suggested that to surmount this objection concentrations should be expressed in the dimensionless unit mole fraction instead of the more usual mol dm. Since the concentration of pure water at 25°C is approximately 55.5 moldm , the value of concentration expressed in mole fractions = cone in moldm /55.5 Thus, while is thereby increased by the factor (55.5), /3l-l is increased by the factor (55.5) so that the derived values of AG° and AS° will be quite different. The effect of this change in units is shown in Table 19.1 for the Cd complexes of L = methylamine and L-L = ethylenediamine. It appears that the entropy advantage of the chelate, and with it the chelate effect itself, virtually disappears when mole fractions replace moldm . ... 

Interestingly, in a study of the binding of ditopic substrates to such cyclodextrin dimers we saw that the binding was dominated by an improved enthalpy, rather than entropy. The simplest ideas about chelate binding would have suggested an entropy advantage, but in solution enthalpy-entropy compensation can be seen if the binding or release of water molecules is also considered. 

The effect is enhanced by the entropy advantage of losing the two water molecules as the temperature rises ... 

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