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Saint Celestine posted:Whats a chemistry experiment one could perform for a class of kids with a big WOW factor, and isn't going to be dangerous? Burn all of their smart phones? If they are of driving age, you will save lives.
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Mar 14, 2014 22:50
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Saint Celestine posted:This might be an appropriate question for this thread- Watch this video for inspiration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ti_E2ZKZpC4 The color-changing ones are particularly good, and harmless.
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Mar 14, 2014 23:02
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Saint Celestine posted:This might be an appropriate question for this thread- Performing a Tollens' reaction to silver plate a beaker is a fun one.
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Mar 15, 2014 00:03
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Getting a dish of soapy water and pumping natural or hydrogen gas into it then lighting it was always fun. The flames are a little dangerous though. Maybe elephant's toothpaste? Making copper sulfate crystals? genesplicer posted:Some Pro-life rear end in a top hat filled a super-soaker with Butyric acid, then sprayed it through the mail slot of the local Planned Parenthood office. Even after having the affected area dealt with by a professional cleaning/abatement company, the office still smelled like vomit months later. The sad thing is, this office does not perform abortions, and a lot of women missed out on prenatal care until the clean-up could be performed. That's goddamn evil. I mean, more evil than normal for pro-life fuckers. e:V Did you know that lead makes flames quite a pretty pale purple? I do 
Ignimbrite has a new favorite as of 00:27 on Mar 15, 2014 |
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Mar 15, 2014 00:12
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I like the ol' fireworks explanation. Soak some Popsicle sticks in various metal salts and stick them in a larger Bunsen burner. Pretty colors!
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Mar 15, 2014 00:15
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Saint Celestine posted:This might be an appropriate question for this thread- Don't know if it's strictly chemistry rather than physics or states of matter, but walking across a kiddie pool of non-newtonian fluid? They've might have seen it on Youtube but not in real life; just need to figure out a place to source bulk corn starch or something similar for cheap
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Mar 15, 2014 00:27
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HOW COULD YOU posted:For reference, I was looking at the reactor and chatting with someone for about 20 minutes from that view and received less than the dose of radiation you receive from an hour long airplane ride There's a documentary about current and future energy sources called Switch where the narrator visits a working nuclear power plant in Texas for about six hours. His dosimeter badge at the end of the six hours had not recorded a single extra micro-Sievert from when he started.
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Mar 15, 2014 00:27
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One of my father's friends used to work as an operator at a nuclear plant before he retired and told me that the people who work in the plant generally receive much less radiation per year than the average person does.
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Mar 15, 2014 00:49
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I really loved the early years of the Simpsons, but looking back it really pisses me off just how far they've set back the US's nuclear power industry. Sure there would still be the general underlying haze of bad sentiment from Three Mile Island and commie-era reactors going bad to fight, but it seemed like almost every week Simpsons would showcase the incompetence and danger of working at a nuke plant. Ask anyone about radioactive material, and I bet they'll say how it's a bright green glowing sludge that leaks from cracks in a steam cooling tower 
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Mar 15, 2014 01:31
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Sentient Data posted:I really loved the early years of the Simpsons, but looking back it really pisses me off just how far they've set back the US's nuclear power industry. Sure there would still be the general underlying haze of bad sentiment from Three Mile Island and commie-era reactors going bad to fight, but it seemed like almost every week Simpsons would showcase the incompetence and danger of working at a nuke plant. Ask anyone about radioactive material, and I bet they'll say how it's a bright green glowing sludge that leaks from cracks in a steam cooling tower I think Greenpeace is the bigger culprit in affecting popular perception of nuclear power. As in, people do realize that the Simpsons stuff is at least somewhat exaggerated but Greenpeace's bs is taken at face value.
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Mar 15, 2014 01:37
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I've always found Greenpeace's "No nukes! Keep burning coal instead" position to be rather at odds with their supposed pro-environmental philosophy.
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Mar 15, 2014 01:53
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Greenpeace is for the environment what PETA is for animals. 
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Mar 15, 2014 01:57
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Apologies for a content-free post, but as a lurker, I am thrilled that in the last day this thread has had more responses than the meme thread
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Mar 15, 2014 06:02
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Saint Celestine posted:This might be an appropriate question for this thread- Back in highschool my chem teacher did a silly halloween chemistry demonstration thing that involved the color-changing etc fun stuff people have been mentioning, and also that one hydrogen peroxide foam generating experiment (except she did it in a jack-o-lantern so it was ~a super spooky oozing jack-o-lantern~), and she made a supersaturated solution and then introduced a seed crystal so we could all see it suddenly crystallize like magic. She was a pretty rad teacher 
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Mar 15, 2014 06:04
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In year ten we had to make up our own experiment and write a report about it. Whilst the other kids grew flowers in salt water or measured the stopping distance of their quad bikes, I was allowed to spend a bunch of lunchtimes in the chemistry lab making a variety of esters. Being teachers pet has its perks. My favourite was the banana one; I can't remember the name though.
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Mar 15, 2014 08:01
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Schmetterling posted:In year ten we had to make up our own experiment and write a report about it. Whilst the other kids grew flowers in salt water or measured the stopping distance of their quad bikes, I was allowed to spend a bunch of lunchtimes in the chemistry lab making a variety of esters. Isoamyl acetate is what you're after as mentioned in the previous page of this thread.
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Mar 15, 2014 09:12
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Collateral Damage posted:One of my father's friends used to work as an operator at a nuclear plant before he retired and told me that the people who work in the plant generally receive much less radiation per year than the average person does. Yeah, more or less if all safety regulations are followed you are in a building that's heavily shielded from the core, and heavily shielded from the outside. You can actually cut down on the background radiation you'd receive from just going about your day in non-leadlined buildings. This varies from reactor to reactor though. The one I was looking at is a research reactor in a small building, because it was constructed before it was really known what sort of equipment would be hooked up to the beam-tubes. This kind of necessitates proximity to the core. Memento posted:There's a documentary about current and future energy sources called Switch where the narrator visits a working nuclear power plant in Texas for about six hours. His dosimeter badge at the end of the six hours had not recorded a single extra micro-Sievert from when he started. My dose would be about 4 micro sieverts. Old research reactors aren't quite as well insulated as the newer stuff, but then again, they are also much lower power.
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Mar 15, 2014 13:22
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I made a complex for my project which wasn't what I had expected because some solvent methanols had coordinated where I'd hoped my ligand would coordinate, so just speculating about less coordinating solvents looked up trifluoromethanol. Apparently it eliminates to HF ( ) and difluoroformaldehyde which whichever article I was reading was somehow even more concerned about.e: on the subject of nice smelling compounds a lot of substituted pyridines/pyrazines seem to smell like popcorn. e2: And I've always quite liked the smell of pure ethanol. It's sort of fruity or something. XMNN has a new favorite as of 00:24 on Mar 16, 2014 |
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Mar 15, 2014 23:39
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XMNN posted:I made a complex for my project which wasn't what I had expected because some solvent methanols had coordinated where I'd hoped my ligand would coordinate, so just speculating about less coordinating solvents looked up trifluoromethanol. Apparently it eliminates to HF ( While pyridine itself smells like rotting fish. Kind of counterintuitive how something derived from something that smells so foul can smell like popcorn. Never liked the smell of ethanol, reminds me too much of a shot of 96% vodka i once drank. Or vodka in general. Binged too much on it during my late teens so while i recognize that fruity aspect of it i can't knock off the association my mind makes with burning my throat and vomiting.
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Mar 16, 2014 01:33
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Falukorv posted:While pyridine itself smells like rotting fish. Kind of counterintuitive how something derived from something that smells so foul can smell like popcorn. Skatole is counter-intuitive. At high concentrations it smells like poo poo (hence the name) but at low concentrations it smells like flowers. All the refigerators in my lab have weird chemically smells, but the worst is one of the organic groups from another lab. You can tell when they've been in to grab something 'cos suddenly everything smells like crap.
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Mar 16, 2014 03:23
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It's from a few pages back, but re:asbestos-chat: It's actually a pretty common mineral group to find around. The recipie for making it is pretty simple. 1. Find some basalt, such as can be found at the bottom of your nearest ocean. 2. Grind up the basalt into a fine powder. 3. Pump warm water seawater (150C should do the trick) through your basalt powder at pressure. 4. Recrystallization should occur over the next 10-20,000 years. 5. Congratulations, you are now the new owner (maybe) of an asbestos deposit! If not you probably have pretty soapstone! Carve a vase from it or something! The deposits tend to occur at the edges of continental plates, where the ocean floor gets smooshed up into mountain ranges. SoCal is chock full of asbestos deposits, as is the Appalachian range, especially in SE North Carolina.
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Mar 16, 2014 05:56
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Sagebrush posted:The term used for an emergency shutdown of a nuclear reactor (by electromagnetic insertion of control rods, injection of neutron poisons, etc) is "scram", used mostly as a verb: "we had to scram the reactor", "the reactor was scrammed at 00:13:58" Here in Canada we call the emergency shutdown of CANDUs a "trip." Three-Phase also told me once that the term applies to other types of heavy water reactor, not just CANDUs, but my formal education is very Canada-centric (I took a class on CANDU operation). Speaking of natural radioactivity, I had a course called "Environmental Effects of Radiation" where we got to do all sorts of fun activities. One of our laboratory exercises was to leave a radon detector in one of our group members' basements to get a reading on that. Hanging out in a basement, especially in a rural area (due to typical building materials used) can give you a surprisingly high dose. We also went out to play around with some equipment in the field and we found some rocks, just random granite and sedimentary stuff, which caused our electronic dosimeters to scream. Edit: no idea why I capitalized "radon" BattleMaster has a new favorite as of 10:13 on Mar 16, 2014 |
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Mar 16, 2014 08:26
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XMNN posted:Skatole is counter-intuitive. At high concentrations it smells like poo poo (hence the name) but at low concentrations it smells like flowers. Didn't Outkast do a song about this?
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Mar 16, 2014 08:52
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XMNN posted:Skatole is counter-intuitive. At high concentrations it smells like poo poo (hence the name) but at low concentrations it smells like flowers. I wonder if this phenomenon is somehow related to cat-rear end coffee, cat-rear end Chanel #5, and anal beaver juice raspberry/vanilla flavor? "The dose makes the poison" perhaps.
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Mar 16, 2014 09:04
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Code Jockey posted:Didn't Outkast do a song about this? Well, poo poo. I completely forgot that song existed, now it's stuck in my brain.
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Mar 16, 2014 09:57
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BattleMaster posted:Here in Canada we call the emergency shutdown of CANDUs a "trip." Three-Phase also told me once that the term applies to other types of heavy water reactor, not just CANDUs, but my formal education is very Canada-centric (I took a class on CANDU operation). Uranium levels in granite are something like 15ppm as a background level, with similar levels of thorium, and counts of 2-300ppm U being easily obtainable. Sediments are generally eroded off whatever is in the area and then deposited, so if there's granite with high total count, the sediments will be similar.
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Mar 16, 2014 10:06
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Memento posted:Uranium levels in granite are something like 15ppm as a background level, with similar levels of thorium, and counts of 2-300ppm U being easily obtainable. Sediments are generally eroded off whatever is in the area and then deposited, so if there's granite with high total count, the sediments will be similar. There's a lot of regional variation too, here's a map of dose rates at different points in Toronto:  We have a uranium pellet manufacturing plant in our city which has been making CANDU fuel pellets for decades. It has become trendy for yuppies to live in loft apartments that were repurposed from factories, and enough middle-class people moved into the factory's neighbourhood that they started to care (because, you see, it was fine when only poor people lived there?) A few years back some pamphleteer scared people by going door to door and telling residents about this "secret" facility (that was well known and documented and even has signs outside saying what it is) and there were protests and politicians coming and saying that "no level of radioactivity is safe" and such. The government did soil tests to shut people up. The results came back last summer. It turned out that the facility had slightly below average levels of radioactivity, meaning that those random red areas on that map are more dangerous (but still safe) than the factory all those idiots were throwing a shitfit over. It turns out that the nuclear industry in Canada is meticulous about safety and that if there was any danger they would have known about it and fixed it long before any protest had a chance to form. Nonetheless NIMBYism still runs wild. OH WELL BattleMaster has a new favorite as of 10:28 on Mar 16, 2014 |
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Mar 16, 2014 10:26
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DMSO makes a good liniment for joint and muscle pain, when diluted properly. The only problem is stinking of garlic and onions afterwards, which is why it's probably used only in veterinary applications.
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Mar 16, 2014 10:42
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Interesting. It looks like the cause of the (relatively) elevated readings on some of the roads might be due to a certain red aggregate used in their construction. Check out Victoria Park Ave. between Lawrence Ave. E and Eglinton Ave E. It’s the red street on the map, and if you Street View it, you can see that there’s a good match to where the red road surface begins and ends. BattleMaster posted:The government did soil tests to shut people up. The results came back last summer. It turned out that the facility had slightly below average levels of radioactivity, meaning that those random red areas on that map are more dangerous (but still safe) than the factory all those idiots were throwing a shitfit over. If the facility had had ever so slightly above average levels of radioactivity (and there were even odds of that happening), you know those idiots would have screamed bloody murder.
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Mar 16, 2014 10:47
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BattleMaster posted:Speaking of natural radioactivity, I had a course called "Environmental Effects of Radiation" where we got to do all sorts of fun activities. One of our laboratory exercises was to leave a radon detector in one of our group members' basements to get a reading on that. Hanging out in a basement, especially in a rural area (due to typical building materials used) can give you a surprisingly high dose. I remember reading somewhere that in some cold rural areas people have wells/bores in their basements, which provide a vector for a lot more radon gas to bubble up. Anyone know if this is true?
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Mar 16, 2014 10:50
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The Lone Badger posted:I remember reading somewhere that in some cold rural areas people have wells/bores in their basements, which provide a vector for a lot more radon gas to bubble up. Anyone know if this is true? That wouldn't surprise me. If you're boring down into rock that already produces a lot of radon, like granite, then you're just providing a greater surface area for radon to escape and an easier path to the surface.
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Mar 16, 2014 12:42
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Vitamins posted:That wouldn't surprise me. If you're boring down into rock that already produces a lot of radon, like granite, then you're just providing a greater surface area for radon to escape and an easier path to the surface. Yeah, it's all about surface area. The radon doesn't diffuse through solid rock very well and will remain inside it until it decays into a solid. If it's near or on the surface, however, it will seep into the air. Giving it more surface area means that more of it will reach the atmosphere. I've never heard of that specific situation in my studies but it makes sense.
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Mar 16, 2014 12:44
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Surely radon would be too heavy to rise up a well and just sit at the bottom though?
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Mar 16, 2014 13:53
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Rudi Starnberg posted:Surely radon would be too heavy to rise up a well and just sit at the bottom though? If you ever happen to be exploring the old mine tunnels in CA from the gold rush days, and you see a pool of water, if you disturbed it, you'd be assaulted with all sorts of gasses. Methane and such. In the completely still water, it just kind of hangs out, until something "releases" it. Rather dangerous, but if you are already exploring those old mine shafts, danger isn't something you are concerned with.
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Mar 16, 2014 14:49
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Say Nothing posted:DMSO makes a good liniment for joint and muscle pain, when diluted properly. The only problem is stinking of garlic and onions afterwards, which is why it's probably used only in veterinary applications. I was going to ask about this when I saw DMSO come up on the previous page. My wife's parents are into ~alternative medicine~ and pile on the DMSO for any kind of sprain, scratch, or burn. Every time I get a nick or something at their house they try to get me to use it but so I'm too creeped out by the idea of using a horse medicine that instantly makes you taste garlic.
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Mar 16, 2014 15:00
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BattleMaster posted:Here in Canada we call the emergency shutdown of CANDUs a "trip." Three-Phase also told me once that the term applies to other types of heavy water reactor, not just CANDUs, but my formal education is very Canada-centric (I took a class on CANDU operation). At a conventional thermal power plant (i.e. coal-fired), you usually talk about "boiler trip" and "turbine trip" in English.
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Mar 16, 2014 17:41
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Saint Celestine posted:This might be an appropriate question for this thread- There's also the carbon tower from conc. sulfuric acid and sugar. It's a bit dangerous with the acid and it evolves a bit of heat, but we had it shown to us in high school. E: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h38PDCFK3_k ProfFrink has a new favorite as of 20:06 on Mar 16, 2014 |
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Mar 16, 2014 20:03
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Rudi Starnberg posted:Surely radon would be too heavy to rise up a well and just sit at the bottom though? As an adjunct to this, it took an awful lot of mental gymnastics when I was a kid to accept the fact that radon (gas) takes a single-digit number of days to turn into lead (heavy-rear end metal) through the process of  . Learning the actual physics behind it as an adult was very cool.
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Mar 16, 2014 22:52
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If you seal radon in a glass tube, how much lead dust would you get at the bottom after a while?
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Mar 16, 2014 23:01
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ProfFrink posted:There's also the carbon tower from conc. sulfuric acid and sugar. It's a bit dangerous with the acid and it evolves a bit of heat, but we had it shown to us in high school. Can you buy conc. sulfuric acid? Do I just use http://www.sciencecompany.com/Sulfuric-Acid-Concentrated-1L-P6550.aspx ?
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