ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Grote–Hynes theory

Okay, imagine you have a really big toy box with lots and lots of toys inside. You really want to take out your favorite toy, but it's buried at the bottom of the box. So, you have to lift up all the other toys to get to it. This takes a lot of energy and effort.

Now, imagine that the toys in the box are molecules in a liquid, and your favorite toy is the molecule that you want to react with something else. In chemistry, we call this a reaction coordinate.

The Grote-Hynes theory helps us understand how much energy it takes for a molecule to move along the reaction coordinate and react with something else. It's like trying to lift up all the other toys in the box to reach your favorite one. The theory helps us figure out how hard it is for the molecule to move along the reaction coordinate and react with another molecule.

So, in simple terms, the Grote-Hynes theory helps us understand how much energy is needed for molecules to react with each other in a liquid. It's like lifting up toys in a box to get to your favorite one.