Question

What is the specific heat of a substance that absorbs 2.5⋅103 joules of heat when a sample of 1⋅104 g of the substance increases in temperature from 10°C to 80°C?

Answer 1

Specific heat represents the amount of heat required to change a unit mass of a substance by one degree Celsius. This is expressed mathematically as:

#q = m * c * DeltaT#, where

#q# - the amount of heat supplied;

#m# - the mass of the substance;

#c# - the respective substance's specific heat;

#DeltaT# - the change in temperature.

So, if we want to determine the units for specific heat, we'll just isolate the term in the above formula to get

#c = q/(m * DeltaT)#. Since heat is measured in Joules (J), mass in grams (g), and temperature in degree Celsius (#C#), we can determine that

#c = J/(g * ^@C)#.

Therefore, specific heat is measured in Joules per g times degree Celsius.