Base and Acid...?

Question

How do u know whether a substance is a base or acid?
For example is milk a base or an acid?
and what is blood a base or acid???

Answer 1

Acids taste sour, are corrosive to metals, change litmus (a dye extracted from lichens) red, and become less acidic when mixed with bases.

Bases feel slippery, change litmus blue, and become less basic when mixed with acids.

Every liquid you see will probably be either an acid or a base. The only exception would be distilled water. Distilled water is just water. That's it. Most water you drink has ions in it. Those ions in solution make something acidic or basic. In your body there are small compounds called amino acids. Those are acids. In fruits there is something called citric acid. That's an acid, too. But what about baking soda? When you put that in water, it makes a base. Vinegar? Acid.

Milk is a base.

Blood needs a bit more of an explanation. An important property of blood is its degree of acidity or alkalinity. Body acidity increases when the level of acidic compounds in the body rises (through increased intake or production, or decreased elimination) or when the level of basic (alkaline) compounds in the body falls (through decreased intake or production, or increased elimination). Body alkalinity increases with the reverse of these processes. The body's balance between acidity and alkalinity is referred to as acid-base balance.

Answer 2

Bases are substances that when reacted with water create OH- (hydroxide) ions; a base has a pH higher than 7, and to compute a solutions pH you use the following equation: -log[-OH].
An acid is a substance that reacts with water to form an aqueous solution of Hydronium (H30+) ions. Acidic substances have pH's lower than 7.
Milk and blood are both basic.

Answer 3

It depends on the apparatus you have:
In the lab , thee many different types of tests to distinguish between the two by reacting with different substances and observing the results. for example when an acid is placed in contact with a metal such as zinc, it releases hydrogen gas.
however for simple tests, just use a pH electrode and measure the pH of the solution.
if the reading is more than 7 then it is a base
if it is 7 , the solution is neutral
if it is less than seven then know that it is an acid

I hope this is helpful
roger