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In this beginner-friendly introduction to gases, it is important for who are students taking chemistry to have a good understanding of the three common states of matter. The most common states of matter being solid, liquid, and gas. In this specific section, we will be going over the Characteristics of gas. In this state of matter, gases take the shape of whichever container they are in. Whether it is a star-shaped container or a glass beaker, the gas will be able to take its shape. The reason behind this is that gas is the “highest energy form” of matter, meaning that the gas particles are so energetic that they stay in constant motion. So the gas particles are constantly moving and filling in as much space as they can in the container they have been put in. It is also known that gases have no fixed volume; however, compression can change the volume with different pressures and temperatures. According to Charles’s Law, if we were to heat up a container that was filled with gas, not only would the volume increase, but so would the temperature, since they are directly proportional.
Compression, for example, can be shown as a gas filling a cylinder container with an airtight lid sealed at the top. Once the lid is pressed further down, the gas molecules are forced to become more and more compressed. This, in turn, increases the pressure inside of the container because of how little room they have to move. Now, if you were to lift the airtight lid back up, then the gas has a lot more room to fill up. This lets the gas take up much more volume than it did when it was compressed.
Gases are also known to have very low densities, typically about "1,000 times less dense than liquid or solid phases". This just shows how the particles in the gas spread out more compared to the other matter. Another way to better understand this is by the formula of Density = mass over volume. In this way, we can understand that density equals the amount of mass, and since gas has such a low density, it must have a small amount of mass compared to liquids or solids.
Gases also happen to have an immense amount of pressure against the walls of the containers they are inside of. This pressure is due to the constant motion of the gas particles are in and bump into the walls of the container. There are also a total of four pressure gauges. One of the pressure gauges can be found on the top of the container, another one on the bottom, and this leaves the other two to be on one of the remaining sides. By this setup, the four pressure gauges have the same amount of pressure, so the gas pushes equally in all directions against the container's walls.
Now that we have covered the characteristics of Gases, it’s time we learn about the Particulate-level explanation of the characteristics of gases.