Confounding Color

What You Need:

Four flasks, beakers, or drinking glasses

Universal indicator

Vinegar

Ammonia

Pipets

What You Do:

Put 25 drops of universal indicator into the first flask, and then add 200ml of water.

In the second flask, put a dropper-full of vinegar.

Add a dropper-full of ammonia to the third flask. (Be very careful not to breathe in the strong
fumes from the ammonia!)

Put 100ml of vinegar in the fourth flask.

Slowly pour the contents of the first flask into the second one, then the second into the third and
the third into the fourth.

What Happened?

The secret of this magic color change is pH. Chemicals with a low pH (0-6) are acidic, while
those with a high pH (8-14) are basic. (A pH of 7 is neutral: neither acidic nor basic.) Universal
indicator is a chemical that changes color in the presence of acids and bases from a pH of 2 to
10. Acids turn the indicator red, pink, orange, and yellow, while bases turn it green, blue, and
purple. Vinegar is an acid, so when you poured the indicator solution into the second flask, it

turned red. Ammonia is a base, so when you mixed the acidic vinegar solution with ammonia, it
raised the pH and the water turned blue. If you had enough vinegar in your last flask, the solution
should have turned red again. (If it didn't, try adding a little more vinegar.)

Mystery Pitcher

What You Need:

Phenolphthalein solution

Sodium carbonate

Vinegar

5 glasses and a non-see-through pitcher of water

What You Do:

1. In the first glass put a little less than 1/8 teaspoon of sodium carbonate, in the second put 6 drops
of phenolphthalein solution, and in the third put three droppers-full of vinegar.
2. Add a few drops of water to the first glass and stir to dissolve the sodium carbonate.

3. Fill all the glasses with water from the pitcher, then pour all of them back in the pitcher except for
the glass with vinegar.
4. Refill the remaining four glasses - the water will be red!
5. Now pour all five glasses back in the pitcher. Refill the glasses one last time the liquid will be
colorless again!
What Happened?

Like the universal indicator, phenolphthalein is a pH indicator, but it only turns colors in reaction
to bases. When you poured the four glasses back into the pitcher, the phenolphthalein reacted to
the sodium carbonate, a base, and turned the solution to red "kool-aid." To change it back to
"water," all you had to do was add the acidic vinegar, which turned the phenolphthalein colorless
again.

Fake Neon Sign

Do you love the look of neon signs, but want an inexpensive alternative that you can customize
to say whatever you want? You can make a fake neon sign using fluorescence to make
inexpensive common materials glow.

Fake Neon Sign Materials

flexible plastic tubing (usually sold as aquarium tubing)

glue gun

cardboard or other stiff backing for your sign

fluorescent highlighter pen or laundry detergent

water

black light

Make the Fake Neon

The plastic tubing will glow blue under a black light, so technically this project will work if you simply
form a sign with the tubing and illuminate it with a black light (ultraviolet lamp). However, you'll get a
much brighter glow if you fill the tubing with a fluorescent liquid, such as a small amount of laundry
detergent dissolved in water (bright blue) or a fluorescent highlighter ink pad in water (available in
various colors).
Make the Fake Neon Sign
1. Practice forming the word you want on your sign so that you can get an idea of how much tubing
will be required.

2. Cut the tubing somewhat longer than what you think you will need.

3. Fill the plastic tubing with your fake neon. Put one end of the tubing into the fluorescent
liquid and raise it higher than the other end of the tubing. Place the lower end of the
tubing into a cup so you won't have a big big mess. Let gravity pull the liquid down the
tube.

4. When the tubing is filled with liquid, seal its ends with beads of hot glue. Allow the glue
to cool before proceeding to make sure you have a good seal on your 'neon'.

5. Apply hot glue to stick the tubing to the backing you have selected. Form the word for
your sign. If you are making a sign that uses multiple words, you will need separate tubes
for each word.

6. If you have excess tubing, carefully cut the end and seal it with hot glue.

7. Illuminate the sign by turning on a black light. A fluorescent light fixture will provide
some glow, but for a bright neon appearance, use a black light.

The oscillating clock

Introduction
The Briggs-Rauscher reaction, also known as 'the oscillating clock', is one of the most common
demonstrations of a chemical oscillator reaction. The reaction begins when three colorless
solutions are mixed together. The color of the resulting mixture will oscillate between clear,
amber, and deep blue for about 3-5 minutes. The solution ends up as a blue-black mixture.
Materials

Solution A:
Add 43 g potassium iodate (KIO3) to ~800 mL distilled water. Stir in 4.5 mL sulfuric acid
(H2SO4). Continue stirring until the potassium iodate is dissolved. Dilute to 1 L.

Solution B:
Add 15.6 g malonic acid (HOOCCH2COOH) and 3.4 g manganese sulfate monohydrate
(MnSO4 . H2O) to ~800 mL distilled water. Add 4 g of vitex starch. Stir until dissolved.
Dilute to 1 L.

Solution C:
Dilute 400 mL of 30% hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) to 1 L.

You will need:

300 mL of each solution

1 L beaker

stirring plate

magnetic stir bar

Procedure
1. Place the stirring bar into the large beaker.
2. Pour 300 mL each of solutions A and B into the beaker.

3. Turn on the stirring plate. Adjust the speed to produce a large vortex.
4. Add 300 mL of solution C into the beaker. Be sure to add solution C after mixing
solutions A + B or else the demonstration will not work. Enjoy!
Notes
This demonstration evolves iodine. Wear safety goggles and gloves and perform the
demonstration in a well-ventilated room, preferably under a ventilation hood. Use care when
preparing the solutions, as the chemicals include strong irritants and oxidizing agents.
Clean Up
Neutralize the iodine by reducing it to iodide. Add ~10 g sodium thiosulfate to the mixture. Stir
until the mixture becomes colorless. The reaction between iodine and thiosulfate is exothermic
and the mixture may be hot. Once cool, the neutralized mixture may be washed down the drain
with water.

Cloud in a Bottle Demonstration

Here's a quick and easy science project you can do: make a cloud inside a bottle. Clouds form
when water vapor forms tiny visible droplets. This results from cooling the vapor. It helps to
provide particles around which the water can liquefy. In this project, we'll use smoke to help
form a cloud.
Cloud in a Bottle Materials

1-liter bottle

warm water

match

Let's Make Clouds

1. Pour just enough warm water in the bottle to cover the bottom of the container.
2. Light the match and place the match head inside the bottle.
3. Allow the bottle to fill with smoke.

4. Cap the bottle.

5. Squeeze the bottle really hard a few times. When you release the bottle, you should see the cloud
form. It may disappear between 'squeezes'.
The Other Way to Do It

You can also apply the ideal gas law to make a cloud in a bottle:
PV = nRT, where P is pressure, V is volume, n is number of moles, R is a constant, and T is
temperature.
If we're not changing the amount of gas (as in a closed container) then if you raise the pressure,
the only way for the temperature of the gas to be unchanged is by decreasing the container
volume proportionally.
I wasn't sure I could squeeze the bottle hard enough to achieve this (or that it would bounce back) and I
wanted a really dense cloud for the photograph so I did the not-as-child-friendly version of this
demonstration (still pretty safe). I poured water from my coffeemaker into the bottom of the bottle. Instant
cloud! (... and a slight melting of the plastic) I couldn't find any matches, so I lit a strip of cardboard on
fire, inserted it into the bottle, and let the bottle get nice and smoky (and melted more plastic... you can
see the deformation in the photo). Dense cloud, no squeezing required, though of course it still worked.