元明粉即我們所說的硫酸鈉。硫酸鈉的化學式為：Na?SO?；過過硫酸鈉的化學式為：Na2S2O8，從這可以看到，雖然硫酸鈉與過硫酸鈉中文只差一個過字，但它的物理化學性質都是具有很大不同的。
Sodium sulfate is what we call sodium sulfate. The chemical formula of sodium sulfate is: Na ú so ?; the chemical formula of sodium persulfate is: Na2S2O8. From this, we can see that although there is only one word difference between sodium sulfate and sodium persulfate, their physical and chemical properties are very different.
過硫酸鈉，它的化學鍵里含有一個O-O鍵，這鍵很弱，卻因此而讓其具有很強的氧化性。所以，過硫酸鈉是具有強氧化性的，但硫酸鈉沒有。但硫酸鈉是硫酸根與鈉離子化合生成的鹽，硫酸鈉溶于水且其水溶液呈中性，溶于甘油而不溶于乙醇。它具有吸水性，暴露于空氣中易吸水，生成十水合硫酸鈉，又名芒硝。利用這一特性，硫酸鈉可用作干燥劑。而過硫酸鈉沒有吸水性。所以在某些特殊用途時，利用兩者的特性，將兩者結合在一起能達到不同的使用效果。
Sodium persulfate, its chemical bond contains an O-O bond, which is very weak, but therefore it has a strong oxidation. Therefore, sodium persulfate has strong oxidation, but sodium sulfate does not. But sodium sulfate is a salt formed by the combination of sulfate radical and sodium ion. Sodium sulfate is soluble in water and its aqueous solution is neutral, soluble in glycerol but insoluble in ethanol. It has water absorption and is easy to absorb water when exposed to the air to form sodium sulfate decahydrate, also known as mirabilite. Using this property, sodium sulfate can be used as desiccant. But sodium persulfate has no water absorption. Therefore, in some special uses, using the characteristics of the two, the combination of the two can achieve different results.
過硫酸鈉也是過硫酸鹽的一種，又稱過氧二硫酸鈉。過硫酸鈉溶于水產生的過硫酸根離子是一種穩定的強氧化劑，過硫酸鹽產生自由基的反應對于去除石油類污染物具有很大的意義。也因為它的氧化性能，過硫酸鈉的用途很廣：在農業中讓受污染的土壤修復、環境處理中用來進行水處理（廢水凈化）、廢氣處理、有害物質氧化降解；工業上作為乳膠或丙烯酸單體聚合液、醋酸乙烯、氯乙烯等產品的引發劑，它還可以作為脫漿劑和漂白劑，染發劑等等。
Sodium persulfate is also a kind of persulfate, also known as sodium peroxydisulfate. Sodium persulfate dissolved in water produces persulfate, which is a kind of stable strong oxidant. The reaction of free radicals activated by persulfate is of great significance for the removal of petroleum pollutants. Also because of its oxidation performance, sodium persulfate has a wide range of uses: in agriculture, it can be used for water treatment (waste water purification), waste gas treatment, and oxidation and degradation of harmful substances in agriculture; in industry, it can be used as initiator of latex or acrylic monomer polymerization solution, vinyl acetate, vinyl chloride and other products, and can also be used as desizing agent and bleaching agent, and dyeing hair And so on.
