High-pressure solid-liquid phase equilibria

This table gives the melting temperature of ice at various pressures, calculated from the equation for the ice Di - liquid water phase boundary recommended by the International Association for the Properties of Water and Steam (lAPWS) in 2008. See Refe. 1 and 2 for information on the solid/liquid transitions for high-pressure forms of ice. lAPWS gives the following locations for the triple points where equilibrium exists among two ice forms and liquid waten... 

An exceptional case of a very different type is provided by helium [15], for which the third law is valid despite the fact that He remains a liquid at 0 K. A phase diagram for helium is shown in Figure 11.5. In this case, in contrast to other substances, the solid-liquid equilibrium line at high pressures does not continue downward at low pressures until it meets the hquid-vapor pressure curve to intersect at a triple point. Rather, the sohd-hquid equilibrium line takes an unusual turn toward the horizontal as the temperature drops to near 2 K. This change is caused by a surprising... 

The Earth s core is thought to be mainly iron, and seismic data indicate that the inner core is solid and the outer core is liquid. The pressure at the center of the Earth is 3.6 x 1011 Pa, and at this pressure, iron melts at 6350 K. From this information, what can you infer about the solid-liquid equilibrium boundary in the iron high-pressure phase diagram (Pressure and temperature both increase toward the Earth s center.)... 

At high pressures, solid II can be converted (slowly) to solid III. Solid III has a body-centered cubic crystal structure. Line bd is the equilibrium line between solid II and solid III, while line be is the melting line for solid III.P A triple point is present between solid II, solid III, and liquid at point b. Two other triple points are present in this system, but they are at too low a pressure to show on the phase diagram. One involves solid II, liquid, and vapor while the other has solid I, solid II, and vapor in equilibrium. 

The phase equilibrium for pure components is illustrated in Figure 4.1. At low temperatures, the component forms a solid phase. At high temperatures and low pressures, the component forms a vapor phase. At high pressures and high temperatures, the component forms a liquid phase. The phase equilibrium boundaries between each of the phases are illustrated in Figure 4.1. The point where the three phase equilibrium boundaries meet is the triple point, where solid, liquid and vapor coexist. The phase equilibrium boundary between liquid and vapor terminates at the critical point. Above the critical temperature, no liquid forms, no matter how high the pressure. The phase equilibrium boundary between liquid and vapor connects the triple point and the... 

In applying equation 33, Cpsl (the constant-pressure molar heat capacity of the stoichiometric liquid) is usually extrapolated from high-temperature measurements or assumed to be equal to Cpij of the compound, whereas the activity product, afXTjafXT), is estimated by interjection of a solution model with the parameters estimated from phase-equilibrium data involving the liquid phase (e.g., solid-liquid or vapor-liquid equilibrium systems). To relate equation 33 to an available data base, the activity product is expressed... 

The potential of supercritical extraction, a separation process in which a gas above its critical temperature is used as a solvent, has been widely recognized in the recent years. The first proposed applications have involved mainly compounds of low volatility, and processes that utilize supercritical fluids for the separation of solids from natural matrices (such as caffeine from coffee beans) are already in industrial operation. The use of supercritical fluids for separation of liquid mixtures, although of wider applicability, has been less well studied as the minimum number of components for any such separation is three (the solvent, and a binary mixture of components to be separated). The experimental study of phase equilibrium in ternary mixtures at high pressures is complicated and theoretical methods to correlate the observed phase behavior are lacking. 

Solubilities of meso-tetraphenylporphyrin (normal melting temperature 444°C) in pentane and in toluene have been measured at elevated temperatures and pressures. Three-phase, solid-liquid-gas equilibrium temperatures and pressures were also measured for these two binary mixtures at conditions near the critical point of the supercritical-fluid solvent. The solubility of the porphyrin in supercritical toluene is three orders of magnitude greater than that in supercritical pentane or in conventional liquid solvents at ambient temperatures and pressures. An analysis of the phase diagram for toluene-porphyrin mixtures shows that supercritical toluene is the preferred solvent for this porphyrin because (1) high solubilities are obtained at moderate pressures, and (2) the porphyrin can be easily recovered from solution by small reductions in pressure. 

Alkene hydration to alcohols is a reaction of some industrial importance, although there have been few fundamental investigations in recent years. Beranek and Kraus have pointed out that the reaction equilibrium for the vapour phase process, though more favoured by low temperatures, still favours dehydration even at room temperature. Consequently, when high temperatures are employed to give more rapid reaction, high pressures must also be employed and even then the maximum attainable conversion may be low. Matters are improved somewhat by use of a three phase system (solid catalyst, liquid water, and gaseous alkene), for which conversion is improved by virtue of the alcohol solubility in water. 

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