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Liebig condenser


A condenser is an apparatus or item of equipment used to condense (change the physical state of a substance from its gaseous to its liquid state). In the laboratory, condensers are generally used in procedures involving organic liquids brought into the gaseous state through heating, with or without lowering the pressure (applying vacuum)—though applications in inorganic and other chemistry areas exist. While condensers can be applied at various scales, in the research, training, or discovery laboratory, one most often uses glassware designed to pass a vapor flow over an adjacent cooled chamber. In simplest form, such a condenser consists of a single glass tube with outside air providing cooling. A further simple form, the Liebig-type of condenser, involves concentric glass tubes, an inner one through which the hot gases pass, and an outer, "ported" chamber through which a cooling fluid passes, to reduce the gas temperature in the inner, to afford the condensation.

Depending on the application (chemical components being separated, and the required operating temperature) and the scale of the process (from very few microliters to process scales involving many liters), different types of condensers and means of cooling are used. Alongside the temperature differential and heat capacities of the cooling fluids (e.g., air, water, aqueous-organic co-solvents), the size of the cooling surface and the way in which gas (vapor) and condensing liquid states come into contact are critical in the choice or design of a condenser system. Since at least the 19th century, scientists have sought creative designs to maximize the surface area of vapor-liquid contact and heat exchange. Many types of laboratory condensers—simpler Liebig and Allihn, coiled Graham types, simple and Dimroth types of cold finger condensers, etc.—now common, have evolved to meet the practical need of larger cooling surfaces and controlled boiling and condensation in various procedures involving distillation, and a further very wide array of materials for "packing" simpler condensers to increase surface area (e.g., glass, ceramic, and metal beads, rings, wool, etc.) have been studied and applied.


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