STUDIES OF PATTERNS AND STATISTICAL TRENDS IN A DATABASE OF INORGANICCHEMICAL-REACTIONS - SOME INTERESTING OBSERVATIONS ON STOICHIOMETRY

Studies of patterns and statistical trends in a database of inorganic chemical reactions have yielded some interesting observations on stoic hiometry. An empirical relationship linking the number of reactants, p roducts, and elements constituting these substances in a reaction is a dvanced. The suitability and reliability of an approach based on this relationship for predicting the number of products formed in a chemica l reaction is assessed. Also, the relationship has made possible the d efinition of numerical bounds fur the number of products which can be formed in general in chemical reactions and the classification of reac tions in a hierarchy of at least five classes. Other implications of t he relationship are also discussed.