62 W. G. Mixter — On Electrosynthesis. 



also causes chemical union, it is impossible to say. It seems, 

 however, safe to assume that the heat energy plays little part 

 in effecting chemical change for the reason that the heat of 

 combustion increases in the series tabulated much faster than 

 the number of molecules combining. We shall be sufficiently 

 accurate in assuming the heats of combustion to be proportional 

 to the oxygen consumed. For example, the oxidation of three 

 molecules of acetylene gives seven times as much heat as one mole- 

 cule of hydrogen. Further, if the energy resulting from the 

 union caused by electricity of two molecules of hydrogen and 

 one molecule of oxygen causes other molecules to combine, we 

 should expect the energy of this phase of combination to cause 

 further combination and rapid combustion or an explosion. If 

 then the chemical changes in the mixed gases tested were not 

 caused in part by heat, it remains to consider the nature of the 

 change caused by electricity. Oxidation was not effected by 

 ozone nor preceded by its formation, as the discharge was too 

 feeble to produce sufficient ozone to account for the amount of 

 oxidation. Moreover, hydrogen, carbonic oxide and methane 

 resist ozone. The hydrocarbons also were but slightly decom- 

 posed by the glow discharge, as the following experiments 

 show. 8*85 cc of methane, subjected to the discharge for an 

 hour and a half, increased in volume 0'28 cc with formation of 

 acetylene. The change may be expressed by the equation 



2CH 4 =C 2 H 2 + 3H 2 . 



That is, four volumes of methane yield eight volumes of gas. 

 A similar test of 23'8 CQ of ethane for an hour gave 04 cc increase 

 in volume ; only a small quantity of acetylene was formed. 

 The reaction is 



0^=0,11, + 2H 2 . 



That is, two volumes of ethane yield six volumes of gas. The 

 decomposition of the hydrocarbons by the discharge is, there- 

 fore, too slight to account for the amount of change in the 

 mixtures of oxygen. This fact and the non-formation of ozone 

 indicate that the formation of water and carbon dioxide was 

 not due to the union of ions, a view supported by the syn- 

 theses by Losanitsch and Jovitschitsch* of organic compounds. 

 If chemical union in the cases discussed is not to be explained 

 by the ion theory, we may infer that the glow discharge of elec- 

 tricity renders molecules chemically active and capable of inter- 

 acting. We may thus consider the molecular changes involved 

 in electrosynthesis to be analogous to those occurring in syn- 

 thesis effected by heat or light where combination takes place 

 at a temperature far below that at which the gaseous molecules 

 dissociate. 



* Loc. cit. 



