What is a pH word?

What is a pH word?

pH. In chemistry, pH is a measure of how acidic something is. The lower the number on the pH scale, the more acid a substance contains. Lemon juice has a pH of 2.2, since it's acidic. pH comes from the German word Potenz, "potency or power," and H, the chemical symbol for hydrogen.

Why do some words start with pH?

It's mostly used for words of Greek origin and represents the Greek letter phi ⟨Φ, φ⟩. Originally in Ancient Greek, the letter was not pronounced as an “f”, but as an aspirated “p” – like a “p” sound followed by an “h”. So that's why it is represented as “ph”.

pH. In chemistry, pH is a measure of how acidic something is. The lower the number on the pH scale, the more acid a substance contains. The pH scale goes from 0 to 14, with 0 being the most acidic. pH comes from the German word Potenz, "potency or power," and H, the chemical symbol for hydrogen.

The Romans. They translated Greek phi (φ) as "ph" and pronounced it closer to "p" than "f". Native Latin words were spelled with the "f". Ironically, a lot of Latin p-words became f-words (e.g., pedis became "foot").