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Molecular diffusion, often simply called diffusion, is the thermal motion of all (liquid or gas) particles at temperatures above absolute zero. The rate of this movement is a function of temperature, viscosity of the fluid and the size (mass) of the particles.
Fick's first law relates the diffusive flux to the gradient of the concentration. It postulates that the flux goes from regions of high concentration to regions of low concentration, with a magnitude that is proportional to the concentration gradient (spatial derivative), or in simplistic terms the concept that a solute will move from a region of high concentration to a region of low ...
A change in concentration over a distance is called a concentration gradient, a change in pressure over a distance is called a pressure gradient, and a change in temperature over a distance is called a temperature gradient. The word diffusion derives from the Latin word, diffundere, which means "to spread out".
The higher the diffusivity (of one substance with respect to another), the faster they diffuse into each other. Typically, a compound's diffusion coefficient is ~10,000× as great in air as in water. Carbon dioxide in air has a diffusion coefficient of 16 mm 2 /s, and in water its diffusion coefficient is 0.0016 mm 2 /s. [1] [2]
The temperature approaches a linear function because that is the stable solution of the equation: wherever temperature has a nonzero second spatial derivative, the time derivative is nonzero as well. The heat equation implies that peaks ( local maxima ) of u {\displaystyle u} will be gradually eroded down, while depressions ( local minima ...
Since the prevalence of point vacancies increases in accordance with the Arrhenius equation, the rate of crystal solid state diffusion increases with temperature. For a single atom in a defect-free crystal, the movement can be described by the " random walk " model.
Thermal conduction is the diffusion of thermal energy (heat) within one material or between materials in contact. The higher temperature object has molecules with more kinetic energy; collisions between molecules distributes this kinetic energy until an object has the same kinetic energy throughout.
Since the prevalence of point vacancies increases in accordance with the Arrhenius equation, the rate of crystal solid state diffusion increases with temperature. For a single atom in a defect-free crystal, the movement can be described by the "random walk" model.