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Chemical equilibrium is the state in which the concentrations of the reactants and products have not yet changed with time.
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It occurs only in reversible reactions, and not in irreversible reactions.
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Usually, this state results when the forward reaction proceeds at the same rate as the reverse reaction.
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The reaction rates of the forward and reverse reactions are generally not zero but, being equal, there are no net changes in the concentrations of the reactant and product.
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This process is called dynamic equilibrium.
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The concept of chemical equilibrium was developed after Berthollet (1803) found that some chemical reactions are reversible.
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For any reaction mixture to exist at equilibrium, the rates of the forward and backward (reverse) reactions are equal.
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In the following chemical equation with arrows pointing both ways to indicate equilibrium, A and B are reactant chemical species, S and T are product species, and α, β, σ, and τ are the stoichiometric coefficients of the respective reactants and products:

\alpha A + \beta B \rightleftharpoons \sigma S + \tau T
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