Th e standard cell poten/al is o1 en interpreted as the cell poten/al when all the reactants and
products are in their standard states (unit ac/vity for all solutes, pure gases, and solids, a
pressure of 1 bar). However, because such an electrochemical cell is not in general a@ainable, it
is be@er to regard E3 cell simply as the standard Gibbs energy of the reac/on expressed as a
poten/al. Note that if all the stoichiometric coeffi cients in the equa/on for a cell reac/on are
mul/plied by a factor, then DrG3 is increased by the same factor, but so too is n, so the standard
cell poten/al is unchanged. Likewise, Q is raised to a power equal to the factor (so if the factor is
2, Q is replaced by Q2 ), and because ln Q2 = 2 ln Q, and likewise for other factors, the second
term on the right-hand side of the Nernst equa/on is also unchanged. Th at is, Ecell is
independent of how we write the balanced equa/on for the cell reac/on.
