What substance is acting as the Brønsted-Lowry base in the following reaction?
H2SO4 + H20 yields H30+ + HSO4 -

Question

What substance is acting as the Brønsted-Lowry base in the following reaction? 
H2SO4 + H20 yields H30+ + HSO4 -

anonymous · Answer

@Tazmaniadevil @gabebro13

anonymous · Answer

Sorry, don't know this... Chemistry isn't my best subject... Out of the three sciences (biology, physics, and chemistry) Chemistry is my worst and biology is my best.

anonymous · Answer

It's alright. Thank you for looking at it :)

kainui · Answer

What is the definition of Bronsted-Lowry base? How does this differ from the definition of a Lewis base?

anonymous · Answer

I'm pretty sure its the H2SO4 Because it accepts a hydrogen atom

anonymous · Answer

Am i correct in that?

kainui · Answer

Not quite, but you're correct that a base accepts a hydrogen atom. You see, H2SO4 is losing a hydrogen when it becomes HSO4-.

anonymous · Answer

oh so its the H30?

kainui · Answer

Well, more appropriately the H2O is acting as a base. H3O+ is what it becomes after accepting the hydrogen.

anonymous · Answer

So because it gains the hydrogen atom later, the H2O is acting as the base

kainui · Answer

Yeah, pretty much. H2O is a base, so it can accept a proton (hydrogen atom). When it does, we just call it something else. That's why we changed the number from 2 to 3. It looks like this:

|dw:1404573054039:dw| 

So it isn't really "gaining it later" it's just simply gaining it. H2O is just adding a third hydrogen onto it, and that's how it's behaving as a base. We consider H3O+ to be the conjugate acid since it can then lose one hydrogen and become H2O again. It's not really that complicated, just sort of tossing around a single atom.