CHM 260 LAB REPORT

EXPERIMENT NO.

TITLE OF EXPERIMENT

UV-VIS DETERMINATION OF AN UNKNOWN

CONCENTRATION KMNO4 SOLUTION.

PREPARED BY

MUSTAFIDZUL BIN MUSTAPHA

STUDENT NUMBER

2012561259

EXPERIMENT DATE

30/06/2015

SUBMISSION DATE

21/08/2015

LECRURER NAME

NAZWA JON

TITLE
UV-Vis determination of an unknown concentration KMNO4 solution.

OBJECTIVE
a) To determine the maximum wavelength of potassium permanganate.
b) To plot the calibration curve of potassium permanganate
c) To determine the concentration of an unknown solution of potassium permanganate.

INTRODUCTION
UV-Vis spectra can be used to detect for the presence of absorbing functional groups
or chromophores. UV-visible spectroscopy is a valid, simple and cost effective method for
determining the concentration of absorbing species if applied to pure compounds, and used
with the appropriate standard curve. A standard curve relating absorbance to concentration
can be developed for any compound, and used to determine the concentration of samples
containing the same compound.
By using this UV-Vis Spectrophotometer, we can find inorganic aborbing species such
as transition element ions, lanthanides and actinides as well as inorganic complexes or
charge transfer complexes. The UV-Vis Spectrophotometer can be used for wavelength
range of 180nm to 780nm as it emit both Visible and UV light.

INSTRUMENTS
UV-Vis Spectrophotometer.

APPARATUS
Beaker, burette, glass rod, 100 ml volumetric flask, dropper.

CHEMICALS
Potassium permanganate (KMNO4)

PROCEDURE
Preparation of the KMnO4 Standard Solutions
1

0.01 g of KMnO4 were accurately weighted and transfered into a beaker. The solid
KMnO4 was then dissolved with distilled water.

The dissolved KMnO4 was diluted using 100mL volumetric flask and labelled as
100ppm.

From the stock, 5mL of solution was pipetted and diluted again in 100mL. The
solution was labelled as 5 ppm

The step 3 was repeated for 10 ppm,15 ppm and 20 ppm.

Preparation Of An Unknown
1

From the stock, an unknown volume was pipetted and diluted into 100mL volumetric
flask.

The unknown sample was transfered into a beaker and labelled as unknown

QUESTIONS

1. Why is glass not suitable cell material for use in UV spectroscopy?

Because glass will absorb the UV light, thus, making the absorbance reads both
glass and sample measurement.

2. State one advantage of using the UV-Vis Spectrophotometer compared to a

Spectronic-20 for this analysis.
UV-Vis Spectrophotometer will directly plot us the graph compared to Spectronic20 which we have to plot the graph ourselves.

DISCUSSION
From the experiment, we are able to determine the maximum wavelength of the Pottasium
Peranganate, KMnO4 and to plot the calibration curve of KMnO4. We also have determine
the concentration of an unknown solution of KMnO4. KMnO4 absorbs strongly in the visible
range of wavelength between 500 and 550nm on different uv-visible spectrophotometers, it
has been reported as having its wavelength of maximum absorption (max ) of normal
wavelength as 525nm using spectronic 20, 522nm and Robert Bohman in 2006 reported his
work as 520nm using perkins-elmer. At first, in this experiment, an initial permanganate
stock solution is prepared and the solutions to be measured that are 5 ml, 10 ml, 15 ml, 20
ml and also unknown solution are diluted from a dilution of the stock. Once the absorbance
value are taken, Beers law plot for KMnO4 is generated and the concentration of unknown
solution can be determined. We used 15ml of KMnO4 stock solution for unknown solution in
this experiment.
UV-Vis spectroscopy has been used to do this experiment. Absorption in UV-Vis is mainly a
study of molecules and their electronic transitions. In this experiment, a series of samples
and unknown of inorganic complex had been prepared. The inorganic complex used was
KMnO4. The absorption process of the complex is where the electron jumps from an orbital
mostly centered on the ligand to an orbital mostly centered on the metal ion.
The absorbance can be calculate using Beers Law: A bc

A is the absorbance of light by the sample, b is the path length of the light (in cm), c is
concentration (in molarity) and is a proportionality constant called the molar extinction
coefficient (expressed in mol-1cm-1).
After finding the max from the UV-Vis, the Beers Law graph was plotted for KMnO4 and thus
the concentration of the unknown sample can be determine. The correlation coefficient has
0.999981which we get the accurate reading.

CONCLUSION
The max for this experiment is 526.65 nm and the correlation coefficient is 0.999981.

REFERENCE

1.

Bohman, R. (2006, November 4). Ultraviolet/Visible (UV Vis) Spectroscopy of

potassium permanganate.

2.

Douglas A. Skoog, Donald M. West, F. James Holler, Stanley R. Crouch (2004).

Fundamentals of Analytical Chemistry. 8th Edition.