A sample of a compound of cesium (Cs) and iodine (I) contain

  • Thread starter Thread starter CMATT
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Cesium Cs Grams
Join the discussion
Registration is free. Start your own thread to ask a follow-up.
2 replies · 3K views
CMATT
Messages
31
Reaction score
1

Homework Statement


A sample of a compound of cesium (Cs) and iodine (I) contains 51.16g cesium and 48.84 g iodine, how many grams of cesium can be obtained from 85.5g of this compound?

The attempt at a solution

I don't really know where to begin. What I have tried was the following:
51.16 g + 48.84 g = 100 g

100 g - 85.5 g = 14.5 g

51.16 g - 14.5 g = 36.66 g
48.84 - 14.5 g = 34.34 g

I'm pretty lost. The correct answer is 43.7g according to the answer key. How did they get that?
thank you
 
Physics news on Phys.org
You have to use the law of definite proportions (Proust, 1797):

The law of definite proportion, states that a chemical compound always contains exactly the same proportion of elements by mass.

Therefore 100 g of compound contains 51.16g of Cesium. Use unitary method to figure out how much 85.5g of compound should contain.
 
100 g Cesium / 51.16 g Cesium = 1.954

85.5 g Cesium / 1.954 = 43.7 g

I see it now, thank you for your help