Boyle's law

Boyle's law is a special case of the ideal gas law from which one may calculate either the pressure or the volume of gas. It was developed by Robert Boyle in the 1660s and describes an inverse relationship between the pressure (P) and the volume (V) of a fixed amount of gas at a fixed temperature. This law is only valid if BOTH temperature and the amount of gas is held constant.

Boyle's law $\left(PV\right)=constant$ (at fixed temperature and amount of gas)

Example Problem

Two liters of gas at 1 atm and 25C is placed under 5 atm of pressure at 25C. What is the final volume of gas?

$\left(P_{\mathrm {i} }V_{\mathrm {i} }\right)=\left(constant\right)=\left(P_{\mathrm {f} }V_{\mathrm {f} }\right)$ or

$\left(V_{\mathrm {f} }\right)=\left({\frac {P_{\mathrm {i} }V_{\mathrm {i} }}{P_{\mathrm {f} }}}\right)$

$\left(V_{\mathrm {f} }\right)=\left({\frac {(1atm)(2L)}{(5atm)}}\right)=0.4L$

Further Reading

see Ideal gas law

Related topics

Amonton's law

Avogadro's law

Boyle's law

Charles's law

Dalton's law of partial pressure

Ideal gas law

Gay-Lussac's law

Law of combining volumes

van der Waals equation

References

"General Chemistry, 2nd Ed.", pp 103-117, D. D. Ebbing & M. S. Wrighton, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1987. "General Chemistry with Qualitative Analysis, 2nd Ed.", pp. 263-278, Saunders College Publishing, Philadelphia, 1984.