Test Tube Science: Plop Plop Fizz Fizz

Materials:
   -Two test tubes
   -10 mL hot water
   -10 mL cold water
   -One tablet of AlkaSeltzer

Background:
The rate at which a reaction progresses depends on the temperature of the reaction.  This experiment lets observe this first hand.

Directions:
Fill one test tube with hottest tap water available.  Fill another with cold, cold water.  Break an Alka Seltzer tablet into small pieces.  Drop carefully into each test tube.  See which temperature water makes the most popping and fizzing.

Happy Birthday Melvin Calvin

Melvin Ellis Calvin, born April 8, 1911, using the ¹⁴C isotope as a tracer, Calvin and his team mapped the complete route that carbon travels through a plant during photosynthesis, starting from its absorption as atmospheric carbon dioxide to its conversion into carbohydrates and other organic compounds. In doing so, the Calvin group showed that sunlight acts on the chlorophyll in a plant to fuel the manufacturing of organic compounds, rather than on carbon dioxide, as was previously believed.

Remember, if you are not part of the solution, you are part of the precipitate.

Happy Birthday Robert Bunsen

Robert Bunsen, born March 31, 1811 was a German chemist known for perfecting the burner which bears his name.  While developing the field of emission spectroscopy, he co-discovered the elements cesium and rubidium along with Gustav Kirchhoff.

Test Tube Science: Test Tubesicles

Materials:
   -Five test tubes
   -Five barbecue skewers
   -50 mL of juice

Background:
These are fun to have on a warm afternoon.

Directions:
 Balance test tubes carefully in rack.  Fill carefully with juice.  Place in freezer for 20 minutes.  Using barbecue skewers or skinny popsicle sticks, place them upright in slushy mixture.  Freeze until firm.  Remove by running test tube very briefly under warm water.

Happy Birthday Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein, born March 14, 1879.

Happy Birthday Joseph Priestley

Joseph Priestley, born March 13, 1733, was an English natural philosopher known for his discovery of oxygen.  As an avid supporter of the phlogiston theory, he called oxygen “dephlogisticated air” and fought against Lavoisier's characterization of it as an element.

Sodium. Water. Kablooie.

Sodium.  Water.  Kablooie.

Happy Birthday Linus Pauling

Linus Pauling, born February 28, 1901, was an American chemist known, for among other things, his work on the nature of the chemical bond which won him the 1954 Nobel Prize in chemistry (and the namesake of this blog).  He also won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1962 for his campaign against above ground nuclear testing.

Happy Birthday Johannes Brønsted

Johannes Brønsted, born February 22, 1879, was a Danish chemist who, in 1923, introduced the protonic theory of acid-base reactions.