dry ice

I enjoyed reading Yvonne Clifford’s piece, The Diet Coke And Mentos Reaction – Having A Literal Blast!, regarding the sublimation of dry ice, CO_2(s).

That it was the “Best Class EVER” seems to be the common refrain every year by most every student for 30 years after the Dry Ice Day and this year was no exception! Dry Ice is an exciting chemical to bring to the chemistry classroom because it affords endless possibilities for fun. I have a few fun activities that I do each year with my grade

In a previous post, I learned that a Scrub Daddy sponge is mainly comprised of a polymer called polycaprolactone.¹ I have continued to gather information on polycaprolactone and also to experiment with Scrub Daddy sponges.

A favorite experiment of mine is the bucket launch. My students and I recently tried two variations on this experiment. Watch the video below and see if you can explain the differences we observed.

Have you ever wondered where the cloud comes from when dry ice is placed in water? Consider the answer returned in my browser when I Googled the phrase “How does the dry ice cloud form”:

A fun experiment to conduct when discussing phase diagrams is the melting of solid carbon dioxide (dry ice).  To perform this experiment, place small pieces of dry ice (carbon dioxide) in a plastic pipette, seal with a pair of pliers, and position the bulb of the sealed pipette in a beaker of water.  Then sit back and watch what happens!