Bath Bombs - Periodic Table of Videos

Bath bombs are just glorified, perfumed alka seltzer tablets. They're primarily made of sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) and citric acid that result in this reaction...

3 NaHCO₃ (s) + H₃C₆H₅O_{7 (s)} --> Na₃C₆H₅O_{7 (aq)} + 3 H₂O _(l) + 3 CO_{2 (g)}

The cuteness of the dissolving, reacting Mad Scientist bath bomb is fun to watch, but there isn't too much really exciting in this video other than some chemistry folks playing around with the bath bombs - adding them to water, using a thermal camera to check the endothermicity of the reaction, checking the dyes under UV light, adding concentrated sulfuric acid to the bomb (oof), and finally trying to set the poor bath bomb on fire.

Feels a bit like the Nottingham folks are reaching a bit for content here.

Bigger Periodic Table - Periodic Table of Videos

This video is, admittedly, from 2011, so the "just published" article (read it for free here or here or a summary here) that's mentioned in the beginning is well past its newness by now.

At some point the periodic law isn't nearly as neat and clean as I teach my students, and I kind of love that fact. The fact that the edge cases of superheavy elements start to stress our understanding of the quantum mechanical model is fascinating and to me shows that there are more things in Heaven and Earth...

Source - wikipedia

Flesh-Destroying Chromic Acid - Periodic Table of Videos

In posting this video, I went looking for the original video that I was sure I had posted on the blog. Turns out I hadn't, so I'll go ahead and post that below. Might be worth watching it first, though you will get the general gist by watching the above video.

I remember chromic acid being around the stock room of Wabash's chem department - and also around Pru Phillips's stock room when I student taught for her. Pru kept the chromic acid around for when her glassware got too stained for acceptable use.

I'm passingly familiar with the dangers of chromic acid, however, so I don't have it around, and Flinn Scientific doesn't even sell it anymore.

After watching this video, I think that's a good choice on their part.

The 2021 Nobel Prize in Chemistry - Periodic Table of Videos

I know, a rare Sunday post.

I figured it wasn't worth posting this explanation of this past week's Nobel Prize in Chemistry in January when I next had an open spot in the queue of scheduled videos.

So check this out. It's one of the better explanations of why asymetric organocatalysts are Nobel-worthy.

Why Molybdenum is named after Lead - Periodic Table of Videos

The Professor is back, and he's bringing a solid lesson in etymology.

As you'll find in this video, many elements are named for other elements.

Nickel, for example, comes from kupfernickel in German, meaning that the element nickel was 'demon's copper' or the metal that was placed beside copper by demons making the copper harder to mine.

Ok, actually I can only find two elements named after other elements: molybdenum and nickel.

But still...you should go learn what some of the element's name origins.

Exploding Wires & Amazing Molybdenum

I appreciate the playfulness of the Manchester chemists playing around in their videos. They show great curiosity and seem honestly fascinating by the results. The above video shows them running electricity through wires of various metals - copper, aluminum, magnesium, brass, tungsten, gold, molybdenum - in open atmosphere.

Even more impressive to me is their tenacity in trying to explain something once they get unexpected or at least curious results. In the video below, they explore the phenomenon of molybdenum wires producing what they refer to as unduloids - regularly spaced molybdenum blobs - on the surface of the heated wire. 

Super Expensive Metals - Periodic Table of Videos

Are they really worried that The Professor is going to rob the place that they had to strip him and even take away his belt?

Rhodium, iridium, palladium, and platinum are impressively un-reactive, noble metals.

In the video today we get to see these catalytically useful metals being processed from sponge (what I would think of as ore).

I love seeing what I think of as a crude process like forging being used to reshape the incredibly expensive ingots.

And I doubt these are the absolutely most expensive metals out there - I'd put the sodium from previous videos up there - but it is a chance to answer a question I get from students from time to time: "what is the most expensive element?"

Why you need to wear safety glasses

In case anybody didn't know why you should wear your safety glasses - and any other personal protective equipment.

If you still need to be convinced, check out the below video's progression from 1:00 - 3:30.

Very Fast Death Factor

That's a brilliant name for a chemical.

It's absolutely marvelous, really.

And I want nothing to do with it...ever...

Most Dangerous Chemical?

This is one of the pretty standard questions that I'm guessing most every chemistry or chemistry teacher gets both used to and tired of answering.

I can say that my most dangerous chemical ever handled was dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) - which doesn't come any where close to being nearly as dangerous as the stuff discussed in this video.

I totally have a new respect for SO₃, a compound that I've written and of which I've drawn the bonding probably a few hundred times over the year. Turns out to be pretty nasty stuff.