Why is NH3 soluble in water?

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Why is NH3 soluble in water?

Represented with a formula NH3, a mixture of nitrogen and hydrogen gives a product known as ammonia. Ammonia is a colorless gas that is highly associated with a pungent odor. Despite its pungent odor, ammonia is greatly needed for terrestrial organisms to survive because they serve as food and fertilizers. More so, ammonia is found to be one common component of many pharmaceutical drugs sold in the market. Another property of ammonia is that it is a caustic and hazardous substance. Because of this property, ammonia has been widely used for cleaning and disinfecting purposes. Today, it has been widely produced by many countries worldwide, such as the Republic of China, India, and United States of America, primarily because of its effect in agricultural crops as a fertilizer.
One interesting property that ammonia possesses is its ability to be highly dissolved in water. Ammonia is made through the combination of nitrogen and hydrogen in the absence of water. Thus, ammonia is otherwise called as anhydrous ammonia, because anhydrous carries a definition of the absence of water. Despite this property, ammonia is found to be soluble in water because of tits polarity. Ammonia is found to have a polar property because it possesses a partial negative charge due to the attraction of ions towards the nitrogen element. This mechanism is also seen in the molecular compound of water where electrons are pulled towards the more electro negative element which is oxygen. Since both ammonia and water have the same polar property, ammonia therefore is soluble in water. In addition to that, as the mixture of ammonia and water occurs, hydrogen bonds are easily formed. The compatibility of oxygen in water and nitrogen in ammonia form strong bonds of hydrogen making ammonia highly soluble in water.

Author: plaza

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