Introduction to Water - Online Tutor, Practice Problems & Exam Prep

Introduction to Water

In this video, we're going to begin our introduction to water and some of its properties. And so, of course, we already know that water is a small polar molecule with 2 hydrogen atoms and 1 oxygen atom, making its chemical formula H₂O. Now, also recall from our previous lesson videos when we introduced polar covalent bonds, we talked about how water is a polar molecule with polar covalent bonds, and that allows water to have these partial negative and partial positive charges on different atoms.

And so, if we take a look at our image down below of the water molecule, notice that every oxygen atom within a water molecule is going to have a partial negative charge, and every hydrogen atom within a water molecule is going to have a partial positive charge. Now, recall that the partial negative and the partial positive charges on a water molecule are what allow water molecules to form hydrogen bonds. And so, the hydrogen bonds will form between different water molecules.

And so, taking a look on the right-hand side over here, we're showing you water hydrogen bonding. And so, notice that we're showing you these different water molecules highlighted here and in between these different water molecules, we're showing you the hydrogen bonds. And so, you can see that the hydrogen bonds are forming in between different water molecules.

Now, the hydrogen bonding between different water molecules is incredibly important to many of water's properties that support life. And so, moving forward in our course, we're going to talk a lot more about water's properties and so I'll see you all in our next video.

Individual water molecules bind to each other through:

a) Covalent bonds.

b)   Ionic bonds.

c)   Hydrogen bonds.

d)   Hydrophobic bonds.

• A. Covalent bonds.
• B. Ionic bonds.
• C. Hydrogen bonds.
• D. Hydrophobic bonds.

Emergent Properties of Water

In this video, we're going to briefly introduce some of the emergent properties of water. And so really it's water's hydrogen bonding that gives rise to four emergent properties, and really these four emergent properties of water are essential to maintain life on Earth. Now moving forward in our course, we're going to talk about each of these four emergent properties of water in their own separate videos. But notice down below, we're showing you a table of the four emergent properties of water. And so the first is water's ability to perform cohesion, adhesion, and to have surface tension. The second emergent property of water is water's low density when it's in the solid ice form compared to the liquid water form. The third emergent property of water is its high specific heat and heat of vaporization. And then the fourth emergent property of water is that it is used as a universal solvent in mixed solutions. And so once again, we're going to talk about each of these four emergent properties of water in their own separate videos moving forward in our course. So I'll see you all in our next video.

Introduction to Water Example 1

Alright. So here we have an example problem that says, which of the following is not an emergent property of water? And we've got these four potential answer options down below. Now, once again, moving forward in our course, we're going to talk about each of the properties of water in their own separate videos. But from our last lesson video, we should be able to determine what the correct answer is here. And so we know from our last lesson video that one of the properties of water is that it has adhesive and cohesive properties. It can perform cohesion and adhesion. And so because this is definitely something that water is able to do, we can eliminate answer option A since we're looking for options that are not an emergent property of water. And we can also eliminate answer option D since we also know that this is something that water is capable of doing. It is going to be used as the universal solvent in chemical reactions. And so once again, we can eliminate answer option D. So now we're between either option B or option C. And what you might realize is that option C says high density of ice compared to liquid water. Whereas in our last lesson video, we said that there was low density of ice compared to liquid water. And so the high here is actually something that is false because it says high. And so because this is false, this is not an emergent property of water. This is the one that we're looking for. And so option B must be something that is a property of water, and it says moderation of temperature, and this is something that water is capable of doing. And once again, we'll talk more about this idea later in our course. But for now, we can go ahead and indicate that C here is the one that is not an emergent property of water, and that concludes this example, so I'll see you all in our next video.

The emergent properties of water (cohesion, high heat capacity, good solvent) come from the fact that water is ______ and ______ hydrogen bond.

a) Polar, can.

b) Polar, cannot.

c) Non-polar, can.

d) Non-polar, cannot.

• A. Polar, can.
• B. Polar, cannot.
• C. Non-polar, can.
• D. Non-polar, cannot.