And what,
you might be asking yourselves,
have they been doing all these recent months instead of writing high-octane science friction and science fact here on the intarwubs?
Frozen carbon dioxide turns directly into a gas. How sublime! The dry ice is so cold that it causes water vapor in the air to condense, forming a fog.
Answer: All sorts of zany things! During a recent Really Free Market hosted by Occupy Durham, I had the opportunity to do another chemistry show. Like the demonstration in my CO2 Problems video, I used soapy water and phenol red pH indicator to help illustrate the properties of frozen carbon dioxide. The color change is particularly dramatic, and is a good tie-in to the environmental effects of CO2. The greenhouse effect seems harder to demonstrate effectively – if anyone has a good way of demonstrating the idea, let me know!
dry ice and phenol red, bubblin' away... { pix courtesy of Specious }
One thing I showed in this demo which wasn’t in CO2 Problems is the strange noises that dry ice makes in response to metal. If you try to cut a piece of dry ice with a knife, or press a paperclip into it, the ice will make a horrible screeching shriek. It’s most dramatic if you put a larger chunk of dry ice into a metal pot – it will scream and skitter around! My explanation? The warm, thermally conductive metal speeds up the sublimation of CO2 near its edge; the expanding gas pushes the metal away briefly and then the pressure buildup dissipates, bringing the metal back in contact with the ice. This oscillation makes the screeching noise. Try it out yourself and see if you think I’m right!
