What is the chemical formula for the limiting reactant in the reaction shown? Write the balanced chemical equation for the reaction, using lowest whole-number coefficients.

1. What is the chemical formula for the limiting reactant in the reaction shown?
Answer: NO
2. Write the balanced chemical equation for the reaction, using lowest whole-number coefficients.
Answer: 2NO + 2H2 —-> 2H2O + N2
Taking into account the definition of limiting reagent and balanced reaction, you get:
The limiting reagent is one that is consumed first in its entirety, determining the amount of product in the reaction. When the limiting reagent is finished, the chemical reaction will stop.
The reagent in excess will be the one that is not completely exhausted during the reaction, that is, they are those that are partially consumed, "excess" amount of that reagent. This is because the amount of product obtained from the reaction will always depend on the amount of limiting reagent in the reaction.
In this case, you can see that you have two reactants: NO and H₂. Having 4 moles of NO and 5 moles of H₂, you can see that no moles of NO are present in the products, but there is 1 mole of H₂.
This indicates that NO is the limiting reagent, since it is completely consumed, while there is 1 mole of H₂ in excess.
In summary, NO is the limiting reagent.
Taking into account that the reagents are in stoichiometric proportions when the reagents are combined with each other without any of them, you can observe that the chemical equation is:
4 NO + 4 H₂ → 4 H₂O + 2 N₂
Dividing by 2 to get the lowest whole-number coefficients, the balanced chemical reaction is:
2 NO + 2 H₂ → 2 H₂O + 1 N₂
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