Tetraboric acid or pyroboric acid is a chemical compound with
empirical formula
In chemistry, the empirical formula of a chemical compound is the simplest whole number ratio of atoms present in a compound. A simple example of this concept is that the empirical formula of sulfur monoxide, or SO, is simply SO, as is the empir ...
.
[ It is a colourless water-soluble solid formed by the ]dehydration
In physiology, dehydration is a lack of total body water that disrupts metabolic processes. It occurs when free water loss exceeds intake, often resulting from excessive sweating, health conditions, or inadequate consumption of water. Mild deh ...
or polymerization
In polymer chemistry, polymerization (American English), or polymerisation (British English), is a process of reacting monomer molecules together in a chemical reaction to form polymer chains or three-dimensional networks. There are many fo ...
boric acid
Boric acid, more specifically orthoboric acid, is a compound of boron, oxygen, and hydrogen with formula . It may also be called hydrogen orthoborate, trihydroxidoboron or boracic acid. It is usually encountered as colorless crystals or a white ...
.
Tetraboric acid is formally the parent acid of the tetraborate
In chemistry, tetraborate or pyroborate is an anion (negative ion) with formula ; or a salt containing that anion, such as sodium tetraborate, . It is one of the boron oxoacids, that is, a borate.
The name is also applied to the hydrated ion a ...
anion
An ion () is an atom or molecule with a net electrical charge. The charge of an electron is considered to be negative by convention and this charge is equal and opposite to the charge of a proton, which is considered to be positive by conven ...
.
Preparation
Tetraboric acid can be obtained by heating orthoboric acid
Boric acid, more specifically orthoboric acid, is a compound of boron, oxygen, and hydrogen with formula . It may also be called hydrogen orthoborate, trihydroxidoboron or boracic acid. It is usually encountered as colorless crystals or a white ...
above about 170 °C:[
: 4 → + 5
]
References
[Greenwood, N. N.; & Earnshaw, A. (1997). Chemistry of the Elements (2nd Edn.), Oxford:Butterworth-Heinemann. .]
[Abdullah Selim Parlakyigit and Celaletdin Ergun (2022): "Facile synthesis method for in situ composites of TiB2/B4C and ZrB2/B4C." ''Journal of the Australian Ceramic Society'', volume 58, pages 411–420. ]
[Gurwinder Kaur, Shagun Kainth, Rohit Kumar, Piyush Sharma and O. P. Pandey (2021): "Reaction kinetics during non-isothermal solid-state synthesis of boron trioxide via boric acid dehydration." ''Reaction Kinetics, Mechanisms and Catalysis'', volume 134, pages 347–359. ]
[Siavash Aghili, Masoud Panjepour, and Mahmood Meratian (2018): "Kinetic analysis of formation of boron trioxide from thermal decomposition of boric acid under non-isothermal conditions." ''Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry'', volume 131, pages 2443–2455. ]
Borates
Inorganic polymers
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