Boyle’s law states that if you squeeze a fixed amount of a gas into a
smaller volume, the pressure will increase. Explain why?
To understand why the pressure of a gas increases when it is squeezed into a smaller volume, we need to look at the behavior of gas particles. Boyle's law helps explain this relationship between pressure and volume.
Boyle's law states that at a constant temperature, the pressure of a gas is inversely proportional to its volume. In other words, as the volume of a gas decreases, its pressure increases, and vice versa.
The behavior of gas particles can be explained by the kinetic theory of gases. According to this theory, gas particles are constantly moving in random directions and colliding with each other and the walls of the container. When a gas is compressed or squeezed into a smaller volume, the number of gas particles remains the same but they occupy a smaller space.
As the volume decreases, the gas particles have less room to move around. This leads to an increase in the frequency and intensity of the particle collisions with each other and the walls of the container. The increased number of collisions per unit area results in a greater force exerted by the gas particles on the container walls. This force per unit area is what we perceive as pressure.
To summarize, when a fixed amount of gas is squeezed into a smaller volume, the gas particles have less space to move, resulting in an increase in the frequency and intensity of particle collisions. These collisions exert a greater force on the container walls, leading to an increase in pressure.