Explain the role of latent heat in the change of state of a substance.
To understand this concept of latent heat, we must first review phase changes. Phase changes refer to a change in matter from one state to another. The most familiar phase changes are seen in the different states of water, such as freezing liquid water to create ice or boiling liquid water to create a gas. As you can tell, heat plays a major role in changing matter from one phase to another.
Q=mL;wherem=massofsubstance,L=latentheat
L=Qm=heatgivenortakenmassJkg−1
therefore, Latent heat is the amount of heat given or taken per unit mass, to change the phase of the substance.
Also, as we can see in the above formula that heat in the body doesn't change temperature, as the above heat equation is free from temperature. therefore only phase change occur.
Latent heat is the heat energy per mass unit required for a phase change to occur. If we think about substances at a molecular level, gaseous molecules have more vibration than liquid molecules. So when you add heat to a liquid, you are actually causing the molecules to vibrate. The latent heat is the energy required to change the molecular movement. Each substance has a unique latent heat value.