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Sublimation

Easychemistry

A mixture contains camphor along with a non-volatile sand impurity, and the chemist needs to recover pure camphor; which property of camphor makes sublimation the correct choice?

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About This Question

Subject
chemistry
Chapter
purification and characterisation of organic compounds
Topic
sublimation
Difficulty
Easy
Year
2025
Tags
sublimationsolid to vapourcamphornon-volatile impurityphase change separation

Solution

Correct Answer:

Camphor changes directly from solid to vapour on heating

Sublimation is the process in which a solid, on heating, passes directly into the vapour state without melting into a liquid, and on cooling the vapour condenses back to the solid. It is used to purify solids such as camphor, naphthalene, anthracene, and benzoic acid that sublime, provided the impurities present do not sublime. When the camphor-sand mixture is heated, camphor vaporises and recondenses as pure crystals on a cooler surface, while the non-volatile sand remains behind. The statement that camphor changes directly from solid to vapour is precisely the property exploited here. High solubility in cold water is incorrect and is unrelated to sublimation, which is a phase-change separation, not a solubility separation. A very high boiling point is not the relevant criterion; sublimation depends on direct solid-to-vapour transition, not on boiling. Camphor does not react chemically with sand, so chemical reaction is irrelevant. This separation of a sublimable solid from a non-sublimable impurity is the standard NCERT illustration of sublimation. Plausibility check: only a substance that bypasses the liquid phase can be separated cleanly by sublimation from non-volatile sand.

This easy difficulty chemistry question is from the chapter purification and characterisation of organic compounds, covering the topic of sublimation. It appeared in the 2025 exam.

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