Creation
The electrolysis occurs in a specially designed reactor which allows the separation of the cathodic and anodic solutions. In this process, hydrogen gas and hydroxide ions are produced at the cathode, leading to an alkaline solution that consists essentially of sodium hydroxide (lye). At the anode, chloride ions are oxidized to elemental chlorine. If some of this chlorine is allowed to combine with some of the hydroxide ions produced at the cathode, it disproportionates into hypochlorous acid, a weak acid and an oxidizing agent. This "acidic electrolyzed water" can be raised in pH by mixing in the desired amount of hydroxide ion solution from the cathode compartment, yielding a solution of sodium hypochlorite NaClO which is the major component of ordinary household laundry bleach. A solution whose pH is 7.3 will contain equal concentrations of hypochlorous acid and hypochlorite ion; reducing the pH will shift the balance toward the acid.
Read more about this topic: Electrolysed Water
Famous quotes containing the word creation:
“For me, the principal fact of life is the free mind. For good and evil, man is a free creative spirit. This produces the very queer world we live in, a world in continuous creation and therefore continuous change and insecurity. A perpetually new and lively world, but a dangerous one, full of tragedy and injustice. A world in everlasting conflict between the new idea and the old allegiances, new arts and new inventions against the old establishment.”
—Joyce Cary (1888–1957)
“Like everything which is not the involuntary result of fleeting emotion but the creation of time and will, any marriage, happy or unhappy, is infinitely more interesting than any romance, however passionate.”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)
“As every season seems best to us in its turn, so the coming in of spring is like the creation of Cosmos out of Chaos and the realization of the Golden Age.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)