Physical Science

Candy glass is easy and fun to make.  The project involves chemistry and cooking, a win-win combination.  As the sugar is heated with the other ingredients, the sugar’s chemical structure changes and it binds to the other materials.  Heat becomes…
Read more

In movies, you see a fight such as a barroom brawl.  Someone hurls another person through a glass window or door.  You hear a spectacular crashing sound but the person gets away unhurt except for some fake blood. The jagged…
Read more

Do you care if a chemical reaction is endothermic?  Do you like ice cream?  Without an endothermic reaction, ice cream would just be soup. First, what is an endothermic reaction?  Glad you asked.  An endothermic reaction is a chemical reaction…
Read more

Gunpowder, or black powder (also called blasting powder), is not a chemical, but a mixture, though its decomposition, or deflagration, is a chemical reaction between potassium nitrate (saltpeter), sulfur, and charcoal mixed by weight roughly in the ratio 6:1:1. INGREDIENTS…
Read more

Ethylene is a colorless, odorless gas, composition C2H4, it being the simplest of the alkene hydrocarbons having a double bond, therefore it is classified as an unsaturated hydrocarbon. It is found in trace amounts in Nature (biosynthesis) and plays an…
Read more

Gunpowder, or black powder is a very important factor in chemistry. Although gunpowder can explode, it is primarily used as a propellant. Invented by the Chinese in the 9th century, gunpowder was mainly composed of sulfur, charcoal, and potassium nitrate….
Read more

In response to the question of why air is colorless, the chemist provides a very simple answer. It is only because the gases that make up air are all colorless. There might be some trace gases like chlorine and nitrogen…
Read more

As a result of serious meltdowns in the Ukraine and Japan, safer alternatives to uranium-based nuclear energy are being sought. The chemical element thorium has come into the spotlight as a possible alternative. What is thorium? Thorium is a naturally…
Read more

Arsenic: Is there any better way to subtly do away with your enemies? Everyone from Nero to the Borgias to Agatha Christie has been a fan of it at some point in time. In the literary world arsenic remains one…
Read more

If you are a believer in Greek mythology you could say that Helium comes from the God Helios who was the god of Sun and eventually deposed by Zeus. ♦  Where does Helium come from: Reality  This linking to the…
Read more