Whose law does the following apply: The volume of a fixed amount of gas is inversely proportionate to the total amount of pressure applied?

Boyle's law (sometimes referred to as the Boyle–Mariotte law, or Mariotte's law) is an experimental gas law that describes how the pressure of a gas tends to increase as the volume of the container decreases. A modern statement of Boyle's law is

The absolute pressure exerted by a given mass of an ideal gas is inversely proportional to the volume it occupies if the temperature and amount of gas remain unchanged within a closed system.

Mathematically, Boyle's law can be stated as

P ∝ 1 V {\displaystyle P\propto {\frac {1}{V}}} P\propto {\frac {1}{V}}

or

P V = k {\displaystyle PV=k} PV=k

where P is the pressure of the gas, V is the volume of the gas, and k is a constant.

The equation states that product of pressure and volume is a constant for a given mass of confined gas as long as the temperature is constant. For comparing the same substance under two different sets of conditions, the law can be usefully expressed as

P 1 V 1 = P 2 V 2 . {\displaystyle P_{1}V_{1}=P_{2}V_{2}.} P_{1}V_{1}=P_{2}V_{2}.

The equation shows that, as volume increases, the pressure of the gas decreases in proportion. Similarly, as volume decreases, the pressure of the gas increases. The law was named after chemist and physicist Robert Boyle, who published the original law in 1662.