Question

How would you label each formula in the chemical equation below as either a reactant or a product? $Fe + S \to FeS$

Answer 1

To solve this question one must be clear about what is chemical reaction, chemical equation, balanced chemical equation. All the three terms are related with each other and similar in many ways.

Complete step by step answer:
The chemical reaction is defined as the change taking place when two or more chemical elements chemically react with each other under certain circumstances to form a new compound.
The element or compound which are reacting are known as the reactant and the compound which is formed by the chemical reaction is known as the product.
The chemical equation is the symbolic representation of the chemical reaction where the reactants are written on the left side of the chemical reaction and the products are written on the right side of the chemical reaction.
In a balanced chemical equation, the number of atoms present in the left side of the chemical reaction (reactant side) is equal to the number of atoms present in the right side of the chemical reaction (product side).
The given chemical reaction is shown below.
$Fe + S \to FeS$
In this reaction, iron reacts with sulfur to form iron (II) sulphide.
The neutral iron Fe atom and neutral sulphur S atom are the reactants.
The compound iron (II) sulphide FeS is the product.

Note:
The given reaction is already balanced as the number of atoms on both sides of the reaction are the same. The balanced chemical reaction follows the Law of Conservation of mass. The law states that the mass can neither be created nor be destroyed but only can be transformed from one form to another.