ACID-BASE REACTIONS

To an extent, acids and bases can be defined in terms of factors that are apparent to the senses: edible acids taste sour, for instance, while bases are bitter-tasting and slippery to the touch. The best way to understand these two types of substances, however, is in terms of their behavior in chemical reactions. Not only do the reactions of acids and bases result in the creation of salts and water, but acids and bases can be defined by the ways in which they participate in a reaction—for instance, by donating or accepting electron pairs. The reaction of acids and bases to form water and salts is called neutralization, and it has a wide range of applications, including the promotion of plant growth in soil and the treatment of heartburn in the human stomach. Neutralization also makes it possible to test substances for their pH level, a measure of the degree to which the substance is acidic or alkaline.