20 Examples of Chemical Reactions

It is called chemical reaction to the process by which one or more chemical substances (called "reactants") are transformed and give rise to others (called "products"). Thus, for reactants to generate products through a chemical reaction, a rearrangement of atoms Y molecules in which an energy exchange occurs. For example: combustion, oxidation, acid-base reactions.

The chemical compounds have chemical energy in the bonds between the atoms that compose them. Chemical reactions are usually expressed through equations, where the reactants are indicated on the left and the products on the right, linking both parts with a right arrow if the reaction is reversible or a back and forth arrow if it is a reaction reversible.

When the amounts or proportions in which the reactants react and the products are obtained are indicated, we speak of stoichiometric reactions.

Where:

• A and B are the reactants.
• C and D are the products.
• a, b, c, d are the stoichiometric coefficients (number of molecules or atoms of a certain type that participate in a chemical equation).

Chemical reactions can be classified according to the type of energy they release or absorb. In this sense, they can be exothermic or endothermic (if they release or absorb hot), exoluminous or endoluminous (if they release or absorb light), exoelectric or endoelectric (if they produce or need electricity).

The laws of chemical reactions

In chemical reactions the laws are fulfilled. The most important is the law of conservation of mass or law of Lavoisier, formulated by this chemist in 1774, which postulates that in every chemical reaction the mass of the reactants is equal to the mass of the products.

It was Dalton who completed the explanation of this law some years later, by indicating that in a chemical reaction the number of atoms does not vary when comparing reactants with products, only their organization changes, so the mass of se preserves.

Another important parameter in chemical reactions is their reaction speed since not all take the same time to produce. The reaction rate is defined as the amount of product that appears per unit of time or the amount of reagent that disappears per unit of time.

Although each reaction has a different speed, certain factors can cause it to tend to increase or decrease: the contact surface between the reacting particles and the temperature are some of the they.

The catalysts They are substances that increase the speed of a reaction, without modifying its structure. This role is often fulfilled by some metals.

Examples of chemical reactions

Chemical reactions occur continuously in nature, in the human body, in factories, in effluent treatment plants, etc. Some examples are:

1. Combustion
   
2. Substitution
   
3. Addition
   
4. Elimination
   
5. Oxidation
   
6. Reduction
   
7. Acid-base reactions
   
8. Oxygenation
   
9. Transamination
   
10. Chlorination
    
11. Carbonylation
    
12. Nitrosilation. It is a reaction where a nitrosyl group is attached to a protein, after it has been synthesized by ribosomes.
    
13. Peroxidation
    
14. Photolysis of water
    
15. Sulfation
    
16. Carbonation
    
17. Ozonation. It is an alternative reaction to chlorination to decontaminate water.
18. Esterification
    
19. Hydrogenation of alkenes
    
20. Acetylation