liquids

It's almost time for the Fouth of July here in the United States of America. In honor of my country, I'd like to share the following chemical mystery, which involves the colors red, white, and blue: just like the American flag! Check out the video below, and see if you can't solve the mystery of the colors appearing "out of the blue"!

Are you familiar with the dynamic density bottle experiment? This interesting experiment was invented by Lynn Higgins, and is sold by various science supply companies.^1,2 Two immiscible liquids (usually salt water and isopropyl alcohol) and two different types of plastic pieces are contained within a dynamic density bottle.

I recently posted a video on Twitter of an experiment my students were conducting in class. I thought I’d blog about the experiment, since it seemed to generate a lot of interest.

In Chemical Mystery #5, I used chemistry to give the illusion that water can be lit on fire. The trick involves the use of hexane (C₆H₁₄) which is flammable, less dense than water, and immiscible with water. In the video below you can see how to set up and carry out this demonstration.