Balancing of chemical reactions involves solution of the atom balance equations implied by the chemical equation. generally there are less equations than unknowns. To leads to ambiguity in the solution (we say that the problem is is ill-posed). To resolve the ambiguity we require that the solutions (reaction coefficients) be the set of integers of lowest possible value.
To prepare for this lecture, please read sections 3.6-3.7 of Zumdahl.
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