What is an ACID CATALYST?

Question

i am reading about solid acid catalysts..what r they??

Answer 1

you are probably talking about a reaction that needs to be in an acidic environment to be able to proceed with any reasonable rate.

catalyst is just something that reduces the activation energy required to move your reaction forward, but does not get used up in the process.  This makes the reaction happen faster.

There are many different kinds of catalysts, and what to use as a catalyst is dependent on what you want to make your reaction go forward.  In many organic reactions, to speed up the rate of reaction a proton donor needs to be available.  During the reaction the proton will be given back to the donor, so it doesn't change the catalyst.

The acid catalyst is just something there that makes the reaction go faster for instances where the reactants merge faster with a helper proton around.

You'll probably find that some reactions you are about to learn about require a base catalyst, while others require an acid catalyst.