Plutonium

Source - https://xkcd.com/2115/

Rollover Text - It's like someone briefly joined the team running the universe, introduced their idea for a cool mechanic, then left, and now everyone is stuck pretending that this wildly unstable dynamic makes sense.

See, it's funny because the concept of a solid chunk of metal just generating energy for billions of years is just ridiculous.

Except that it isn't.

Nitromethane Jet Bottle - Looks Awesome in 4k Slow Motion - aka Whoosh Bottle

The whoosh bottle is among my favorite demonstrations.

It's easy as pie to set up. It allows some phenomenal chemistry to be shown (limiting reactants, combustion, exothermic reactions, energy transfer).

And it looks gorgeous.

I'm not sure that the nitromethane woosh bottle adds anything cool, but the slow-mo, 4K video definitely does.

$500,000 of Calcium - Periodic Table of Videos

I think it's necessary to watch the below video first to understand the above video.

Take a couple of minutes. I'll wait.



It's the moment at 2:50 where they mention at the "cost of the calcium they consume is 10% of the operation costs of the machine" that got me.

That and the fact that Yuri Oganessian is there...talking. He's only the second person to have had an element named after himself while he was alive and the only person currently alive to have that happen.

He is among the greatest chemistry (or physicists) alive.

Back to the calcium, though. I initially wondered about why the calcium would be so amazingly expensive, thinking maybe it had to do with simple purification to make sure there weren't any non-calcium contaminants. But I hadn't thought about the need to only use heavy isotopes of calcium - specifically calcium-48 - for the nuclear synthesis. Purifying calcium's mixture of calcium isotopes into just calcium-48 (0.187% of all calcium atoms according to wikipedia and confirmed by webelements) is apparently tough...and expensive.

I especially appreciate that the Professor mentions (at 1:40 in the top video) that his shaky hands prevent him from even touching the vial of calcium-48 carbonate.

Where Do Trees Get Their Mass?

Last week we saw a video that asked us what happens to the mass you lose when you lose weight.

This week we look at the reverse. Where does the mass come from when a tree grows?

It's a remarkably similar answer because generally, reactions are reversible.

This question is incredibly subtle, and not even high-level science students get it right...



As a side note, I can see through Dr Derek at about 3:50.