A chemist wants to extract the gold from 69.59 g of AuCl3 · 2 H2O (gold(III) chloride dihydrate) by electrolysis of an aqueous solution. What mass of gold could be obtained from this sample?

Question

A chemist wants to extract the gold from 69.59 g of AuCl3 · 2 H2O (gold(III) chloride dihydrate) by electrolysis of an aqueous solution.

What mass of gold could be obtained from this sample?

Answer in units of g

Answer 1

The theoretical mass of Au can calculated as follows:

60.59 g AuCl₃*2H₂O x 1 mol AuCl₃*2H₂O / 339 g x 1 mol Au / mol AuCl₃*2H₂O x 197 g Au/mol = 35.2 g Au