Colloid Colloid In chemistry, a colloid is a mixture in which one substance of microscopically dispersed insoluble particles is suspended throughout another substance. Sometimes the dispersed substance alone is called the colloid; the term colloidal suspension refers unambiguously to the overall mixture (although a narrower sense of the word "suspension" is distinguished from colloids by larger particle size). Unlike a solution, whose solute and solvent constitute only one phase, a colloid has a dispersed phase (the suspended particles) and a continuous phase (the medium of suspension). To qualify as a colloid, the mixture must be one that does not settle or
Homogeneous and heterogeneous mixtures constant. Homogeneous mixtures always have the same composition. Mixtures can be characterized by being separable by mechanical means e.g. heat, filtration, gravitational sorting, etc. During the sampling of heterogeneous mixtures of particles, the variance of the sampling error is generally non-zero. Gy's sampling theory quantitatively defines the heterogeneity of a particle as: where l90-8i Homogeneous and heterogeneous mixtures A homogeneous mixture is a solid, liquid, or gaseous mixture that has the same proportions of its components throughout any given sample. Conversely, a heterogeneous mixture has components whose proportions vary throughout the sample. "Homogeneous" and "heterogeneous" are not absolute terms but