Chapter 4. Vapor Pressure

Summary

Since chemical transport and transformations of gaseous molecules are often important, it is necessary to understand the tendency of a compound to accumulate in the vapor phase at equilibrium. Moreover, since vapor pressures reflect the partitioning of compounds between the gas phase and the pure compounds themselves, this compound-specific parameter is used to illustrate how chemical structures dictate intermolecular interactions and how these in turn control macroscopic properties. The dependency of vapor pressures on temperature is developed. Finally, means to estimate vapor pressures from chemical structures, and in particular estimates of those compound's entropies of vaporization and fusion, are demonstrated.