Strawberries make surprisingly GIANT bubbles (Best DIY Bubble Recipes)

I appreciate that Ben aka NightHawkInLight now shows his face in his videos. It's a little less creepy than having his videos narrated.

This video shows his findings to make the most durable, long-lasting giant bubbles out of Dawn dish soap, water, salt, baking soda, and J Lube. The titular comment about strawberries is because strawberry DNA is surprisingly easy to extract and highly prevalent within strawberry cells. 

Much of the video - from about 4:15-13:00 - is about Ben's attempts to extract the DNA from strawberries. It's a recreation of a fairly simple and common first year high school biology lab. 

From there, Ben tests his solutions with and without three different polymers - J Lube, strawberry DNA, PEO (polyethylene oxide, poly ox), and no polymer addition.

Then Ben re-tests solutions with an even larger bubble wand made of fishing poles. He does manage to make a few really gorgeous, colossal bubbles - some under lower humidity conditions and again when the humidity is approaching 100%. 

Along the way we do get a whole lot of Ben chuckles, so be prepared for that. 

If ever I want to make huge bubbles, the J Lube would be the recipe I'm looking to use. 

Coating to make soap pour cleanly out of plastic bottles, reduce waste and frustration

Anything that makes recylcing easier is to be lauded.

In this article from phys.org, Ohio State researchers found a way to spray coat polypropylene and polycarbonate with

a small amount of solvent and ultra-fine silica nanoparticles onto the inside of bottles. Manufacturers already use solvents to change the texture of molded plastics, because they cause the surface of the plastic to soften a little. By mixing the silica and solvent, the researchers were able to soften the surface of the polypropylene just enough that when the plastic re-hardened, the silica would be embedded in the surface. 

The structures are only a few micrometers—millionths of a meter—high, and covered in even smaller branchlike projections. They look like shaggy heart-shaped pillows, but they're hard as glass. 

They don't cover the inside of the bottle completely, either, but instead are planted a few micrometers apart. The main branches of the "y" overhang the plastic surface at an angle less than 90 degrees—steep enough that water, oils and even surfactant can't physically sustain a droplet shape that would fall in between the branches and touch the plastic. 

"You end up with air pockets underneath, and that's what gives you liquid repellency," Brown said.  

Instead of spreading out on the surface, the soap droplets form beads and roll right off.