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dastefster dastefster
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11 years ago
Sucrose or table sugar can react with water to form 2 other compounds glucose and fructose. However when you add sugar to a glass water this reaction proceeds extremely slowly. Why does it proceed slowly and what else is needed to speed up the reaction??

Its a critical thinking question, and i don't get it...
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wrote...
11 years ago
You need to add dilute acid (like hydrochloric) to catalyze the reaction. Or you have to eat the sugar, and then the enzyme sucrase will catalyze digestion.
wrote...
11 years ago
The full answer follows, which is quite academic. Good question BTW.

Kinetics and Thermodynamics of Sucrose Hydrolysis
The reaction rate constant of the first-order kinetics follows an Arrhenius relation with activation energy of 109.2 kJ/mol of sucrose. On hydrolysis, the enthalpy decreases by 14.4 kJ/mol of sucrose at 310 K, and the heat capacity, Cp, increases by 61 J mol-1 K-1 of sucrose in the solution. The enthalpy of hydrolysis decreases with increase in the temperature and Cp on hydrolysis increases. The effects are attributed to change in the configurational and vibrational partition functions as one covalent bond in sucrose breaks to form two molecules, which then individually form additional hydrogen bonds and alter the water's structure in the solution. Cp of the solution increases with temperature less rapidly before sucrose hydrolysis than after it. This may reflect an increase in the configurational contribution to Cp as the hydrogen bond population changes.
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