Why are polar substances soluble in water?

1 Answer
anor277
Jan 18, 2018

Well, to a first approximation ALL solutes are soluble in water...

Explanation:

Water is a strongly dipolar substance...i.e. water consists of a molecular dipole that we could represent as #stackrel(delta^+)H-stackrel(delta^-)O-stackrel(delta^+)H#...and this molecular dipole is good at separating the charges of ions....how many ionic solutes are soluble in water?...and also at solvating polar substances such as #HF#, #HCl#, and alcohols etc.

Note that all of this rationalization is AFTER you do the experiment.

Related questions
Impact of this question
999 views around the world
You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License