Hot ice Sodium acetate or hot ice is an amazing chemical you can prepare yourself from baking soda

and vinegar. You can cool a solution of sodium acetate below its melting point and then cause the liquid to crystallize. The crystallization is an exothermic process, so the resulting ice is hot. Solidification occurs so quickly you can form sculptures as you pour the hot ice. Sodium Acetate or Hot Ice Materials

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Once you remove the sodium acetate solution from heat, immediately cover it to prevent any further evaporation. I poured my solution into a separate container and covered it with plastic wrap. You should not have any crystals in your solution. If you do have crystals, stir a very small amount of water or vinegar into the solution, just sufficient to dissolve the crystals. Place the covered container of sodium acetate solution in the refrigerator to chill.

Activities Involving Hot Ice 1 liter clear vinegar (weakacetic acid) 4 tablespoons baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) The sodium acetate in the solution in the refrigerator is an example of a supercooled liquid. That is, the sodium acetate exists in liquid form below its usual melting point. You can initiate crystallization by adding a small crystal of sodium acetate or possibly even by touching the surface of the sodium acetate solution with a spoon or finger. The crystallization is an example of an exothermic process. Heat is released as the 'ice' forms. To demonstrate supercooling, crystallization, and heat release you could: Drop a crystal into the container of cooled sodium acetate solution. The sodium acetate will crystallize within seconds, working outward from where you added the crystal. The crystal acts as a nucleation site or seed for rapid crystal growth. Although the solution just came out of the refrigerator, if you touch the container you will find it is now warm or hot. Pour the solution onto a shallow dish. If the hot ice does not spontaneously begin crystallization, you can touch it with a crystal of sodium acetate (you can usually scrape a small amount of sodium acetate from the side of the container you used earlier). The crystallization will progress from the dish up toward where you are pouring the liquid. You can construct towers of hot ice. The towers will be warm to the touch. You can re-melt sodium acetate and re-use it for demonstrations. Hot Ice Safety As you would expect, sodium acetate is a safe chemical for use in demonstrations. It is used as a

Prepare the Sodium Acetate or Hot Ice 1. In a saucepan or large beaker, add baking soda to the vinegar, a little at a time and stirring between additions. The baking soda and vinegar react to form sodium acetate and carbon dioxide gas. If you don't add the baking soda slowly, you'll essentially get abaking soda and vinegar volcano, which would overflow your container. You've made the sodium acetate, but it is too dilute to be very useful, so you need to remove most of the water. Here is the reaction between the baking soda and vinegar to produce the sodium acetate: Na [HCO3] + CH3COOH CH3COO + Na + H2O + CO2 2.
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Boil the solution to concentrate the sodium acetate. You could just remove the solution from heat once you have 100-150 ml of solution remaining, but the easiest way to get good results is to simply boil the solution until a crystal skin or film starts to form on the surface. This took me about an hour on the stove over medium heat. If you use lower heat you are less likely to get yellow or brown liguid, but it will take longer. If discoloration occurs, it's okay.

food additive to enhance flavor and is the active chemical in many hot packs. The heat generated by the crystallization of a refrigerated sodium acetate solution should not present a burn hazard. Hot Ice Help Answers to common questions about hot ice are available that should help solve any problems you may encounter with this project. There is also a video tutorial showing how to make hot ice.

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involves white phosphorus, which can be absorbed through your skin and is toxic. If you don't have scissors, you can do this trick by tearing off the striker portion of the matchbox with your fingers. It's just easier to cut out the striker, if you can. You could use the matches in the matchbox, rather than a lighter, of course.

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What You Need

matchbox of safety matches cold water faucet or chilled pan scissors lighter

2. Smoking Fingers
Here's How: 1. Cut out the striker portion of a matchbox from a box of safety matches. Trim off any paper around the striker. Fold the striker in half, striker-sides facing each other. Set the folded striker on top of the running cold water faucet or a refrigerated metal pan. Use a lighter to set fire to the striker. Ignite both ends. Then run the lighter along the length of the folded striker. It won't burn to ash, which is fine. Discard the burned striker. You will see a brown residue that has been deposited along the top of the faucet or metal pan. Run your fingertip along the residue to pick it up. Slowly rub your finger and thumb together. If you do this in the dark, your fingers will have a greenish glow. Very, very cool.

3. Bending water
When two objects are rubbed against each other, some of theelectrons from one object jump to the other. The object that gains electrons becomes more negatively charged; the one that loses electrons becomes more positively charged. The opposite charges attract each other in a way that you can actually see. One way to collect charge is to comb your hair with a nylon comb or rub it with a balloon. The comb or balloon will become attracted to your hair, while the strands of your hair (all the same charge) repel each other. The comb or balloon will also attract a stream of water, which carries an electrical charge. Difficulty: Easy Time Required: minutes Here's How: 1. Comb dry hair with a nylon comb or rub it with an inflated latex balloon. Turn on the tap so that a narrow stream of water is flowing (1-2 mm across, flowing smoothly).

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Tips: 2. 1. Wash your hands after doing this, and try to avoid breathing in the smoke. The trick probably

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Move the balloon or teeth of the comb close to the water (not in it). As you approach the water, the stream will begin to bend toward your comb. Experiment! Does the amount of 'bend' depend on how close the comb is to the water? If you adjust the flow, does it affect how much the stream bends? Do combs made from other materials work equally well? How does a comb compare with a balloon? Do you get the same effect from everyone's hair or does some hair release more charge than others? Can you get your hair close enough to the water to repel it without getting it wet?

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Method 1: Set a piece of paper on fire and drop it into the bottle. Set the egg on top of the bottle (small side pointed downward). When the flame goes out, the egg will get pushed into the bottle. Method 2: Set the egg on the bottle. Run the bottle under very hot tap water. Warmed air will escape around the egg. Set the bottle on the counter. As it cools, the egg will be pushed into the bottle. Method 3: Set the egg on the bottle. Immerse the bottle in a very cold liquid. I have heard of this being done using liquid nitrogen, but that sounds dangerous (could shatter the glass). I recommend trying ice water. The egg is pushed in as the air inside the bottle is chilled. How It Works If you just set the egg on the bottle, its diameter is too large for it to slip inside. The pressure of the air inside and outside of the bottle is the same, so the only force that would cause the egg to enter the bottle is gravity. Gravity isn't sufficient to pull the egg inside the bottle. When you change the temperature of the air inside the bottle, you change the pressure of the air inside the bottle. If you have a constant volume of air and heat it, the pressure of the air increases. If you cool the air, the pressure decreases. If you can lower the pressure inside the bottle enough, the air pressure outside the bottle will push the egg into the container. It's easy to see how the pressure changes when you chill the bottle, but why is the egg pushed into the bottle when heat is applied? When you drop burning paper into the bottle, the paper will burn until the oxygen is consumed (or the paper is consumed, whichever comes first). Combustion heats the air in the bottle, increasing the air pressure. The heated air pushes the egg out of the way, making it appear to jump on the mouth of the bottle. As the air cools, the egg settles down and seals the mouth of the bottle. Now there is less air in the bottle than when you started, so it exerts less pressure. When the temperature inside and outside the bottle is the same, there is enough positive pressure outside the bottle to push the egg inside. Heating the bottle produces the same result (and may be easier to do if you can't keep the paper burning long enough to put the egg on the bottle). The bottle and the air are heated. Hot air escapes from the bottle until the pressure both inside and outside the bottle is the same. As the bottle and air inside continue to cool, a pressure gradient builds, so the egg is pushed into the bottle.

Tips: 1. This activity will work better when the humidity is low. When humidity is high, water vapor catches some of the electrons that would jump between objects. For the same reason, your hair needs to be completely dry when you comb it.

What You Need

water faucet nylon comb or latex balloon

4. Egg in a Bottle Materials

peeled hard-boiled egg (or soft-boiled, if a yolk mess interests you) flask or jar with opening slightly smaller than the diameter of the egg paper/lighter or very hot water or very cold liquid In a chemistry lab, this demonstration is most commonly performed using a 250-ml flask and a medium or large egg. If you are trying this demonstration at home, you can use a glass apple juice bottle. I used a Sobe soft drink bottle. If you use too large of an egg, it will get sucked into the bottle, but stuck (resulting in a gooey mess if the egg was softboiled). I recommend a medium egg for the Sobe bottle. An extra-large egg gets wedged in the bottle. Perform the Demonstration

How to Get the Egg Out You can get the egg out by increasing the pressure inside the bottle so that it is higher than the pressure of the air outside of the bottle. Roll the egg around so it is situated with the small end resting in the mouth of the bottle. Tilt the bottle just enough so you can blow air inside the bottle. Roll the egg over the opening before you take your mouth away. Hold the bottle upside down and watch the egg 'fall' out of the bottle. Alternatively, you can apply negative pressure to the bottle by sucking the air out, but then you risk choking on an egg, so that's not a good plan.