Kinetics of the oxidation of the formate and deuterioformate ions by permanganate

Abstract

The reaction between permanganate ions and formate or deuterioformate ions has been investigated kinetically between 0 and 50°, both in very dilute solutions and in M-sodium perchlorate. In the former the kinetic salt effect agrees with the predictions of the Debye–Hückel theory, and velocity constants at infinite dilution were obtained by extrapolation. Both at infinite dilution and in M-perchlorate the difference in activation energies for the two isotopic species is approximately 1·2 kcal./mole, and the ratio A_H/A_D does not differ significantly from unity. There is a small solvent isotope effect.