Gas Laws - Boyle's Law

Boyle's Law

Boyle's law shows that, at constant temperature, the product of an ideal gas's pressure and volume is always constant. It was published in 1662. It can be determined experimentally using a pressure gauge and a variable volume container. It can also be found through the use of logic; if a container, with a fixed number of molecules inside, is reduced in volume, more molecules will hit the sides of the container per unit time, causing a greater pressure.

As a mathematical equation, Boyle's law is:

where P is the pressure (Pa), V the volume (m3) of a gas, and k₁ (measured in joules) is the constant from this equation—it is not the same as the constants from the other equations below.

This is known as Boyle's law which states: the volume of a given mass of gas is inversely proportional to its pressure, if the temperature remains constant. Mathematically this is:

where k is a constant (i.e. NOT Boltzmann's constant)