Semester Reflection of Destruction!

This semester was fun.  I've had a blast in 5th hour chemistry, I'm gonna miss it!
I think I officially suck at the periodic table.  It's so hard to keep up with how many electrons go where and I keep forgetting how many s orbitals come before a p orbital as well as when you're supposed to start back at the s orbital again.  That's part of what killed me on my final test.  Ugh!  Hopefully I never have to do that again.
I'm very happy with how 'pro' I am at chemical equations and such.  I got most of the questions regarding chemical equations right on the test and it was fantastic.  Reaction types and laws of mass are so much more fun than the periodic table, as much as I love it.  I'll be very glad to move on to molecules.  I love molecules.  I might not be very good at the periodic table but I'll be happy to draw out sodium chloride. Hopefully I'll stop getting B's on the tests next semester.  I want A's!  I know this is standard based grading but I'm still addicted to the letter grades and percentages on my tests.

Yay end of semester!!!!! (From crunchyroll)

Reaction Types of Doom!!!

Ahh we're finally into my favorite part of chemistry!  I love molecules and chemical equations.  They're so much fun to balance.  I loved balancing equations in intro to chemistry but I really need a refresher on how to do it.  I took the class freshman year and, alas, I have forgotten how to do it.  I just like it.

Learning the reaction types will do for now!

Synthesis:                    A+B→AB
Decomposition:           AB→A+B
Single Replacement:    A+BC→B+AC
Double Replacement:  AB+CD→CB+AD
Combustion:               Fuel+O2→H2O+CO2

So reaction types are easy to remember and are quite obvious.  We did a series of little labs, seven in total, where we mixed a couple of things together or added heat to something and observed the reaction.  Nikki and I wrote down the equation for what happened and what we saw happening and labelled the reaction as one of the types of reactions.  I'm not going to write up all the labs because there were seven of them and I don't feel like writing them up.  Besides that I probably got them all wrong.  It's a lot different to name a reaction or equation from what you see verses what you can do on paper with other reactions.  I might not be able to perfectly translate my skills with this stuff to real world application but I still have fun doing it on worksheets.

Metal Reaction Labby Thingy

Picture taken from my iPad.

To the left you'll see a photograph.  This might be meaningless to you but I shall try to shed some light upon the situation.
In this lab we tested the reactivity of metals with different substances.  We tested zinc, magnesium, and copper, shown respectively in the photograph.  In the first row we placed about 8 drops of copper nitrate.  The second row received magnesium nitrate.  The third row contains zinc nitrate.  And the final row contains silver nitrate.
All of the metals reacted with silver nitrate.  Silver nitrate was the only substance that the copper reacted with.  The magnesium reacted with the copper nitrate as well as the silver nitrate.  And, as you can see, zinc reacted only with silver nitrate and copper nitrate.
It's interesting that copper only reacted with silver nitrate.  What's also interesting is that the zinc reacted to the copper nitrate but the copper didn't react to the zinc nitrate.  I have no explanation for this.  I didn't really focus past, oh hey the metal turned black!  I'm sure the reasons will be clearer in the future.

Another Lab! It's.........IONIC COMPOUNDS!

For the conductivity lab we used:
25 cm Magnesium Ribbon
A tiny crucible
A ring stand
Clay Triangle
Bunsen Burner
Conductivity Tester
Distilled water
Beaker
Balance

The bunsen burner was set up underneath the clay triangle and ring stand.  We weighed the magnesium and crucible separately on the balance and then crumpled the magnesium into a loose ball, put it into the crucible, and weighed them together.  We placed the crucible just over the blue part of the flame on the bunsen burner until the magnesium became so hot it ignited like those flashing fireworks.  Once it was cool enough we measured the crucible with the burned magnesium again.  Once we weighed it and found that the magnesium and crucible had gone down slightly in weight we dumped the burnt magnesium into a beaker and added distilled water.  When we checked the conductivity with our conductivity tester the light lit up at about a 5 in accordance with our last conductivity lab scale, putting it with antacid and light corn syrup conductivity wise.
Nikki made this awesome graph to show what happened.

Apparently the magnesium was supposed to gain mass.  We saw that it lost it, according to its weight.  Alas, we were impatient and our data was tampered with because we didn't allow the crucible enough time to cool down before we weighed it again.  Better luck next time.
The fact that the magnesium product weighs more is the main concern here.  When heat is added to the magnesium it causes a chemical reaction that apparently allows the magnesium to gain more mass.  The law of conservation of mass states that this can't be true.  So what happened?  The only possible explanation is that the magnesium, when heated, was able to combine with the oxygen in the air around it.  That's right, we weren't just heating up the magnesium, but also the air inside the crucible.  Those joined together and rather oxidized the magnesium.  That makes sense in my head but I might be mistaken.

The Conductivity Lab

In the conductivity lab we stuck a conductivity tester in different mixtures of water and either calcium chloride, antacid, potassium chloride, light corn syrup, molasses, or cheerios.  Water conducts too of course so we tested water alone and used the brightness of the light on the conductivity tester as 0.  The products we tested were based on a scale of 0-10 based on brightness of the light.

Calcium chloride was the brightest of the group of mixtures.  We gave it a ten.  Cheerios were the least conductive and there was really no change in the light.  

So what does this graph mean?  Different substances have different levels of conductivity in water.  The charge produced from more acetic substances like calcium chloride and potassium chloride is greater than less acetic substances like antacid, corn syrup, and the others.  The qualities that make substances like calcium chloride sting when they get into a cut create a better environment for conducting electricity.

And no, Mr. Ludwig, I totally swear I didn't get any calcium chloride into the cuts on my hands from physics.  Not that I got any cuts from physics. 0-0

no no no no no noodles (A Periodic Table Post)

Name :           Amber of Awesome                     

	Li	Li	Fr	Li
Highest of Alkali Earth Metals	Be	Be	Ra	Ba	Be	Ba
Lowest of Alkali Earth Metals	Mg	Mg	Ca	Be	Ba	Be
Highest of Transition metals	Re	W	Ir	Y	Au	Hg
Lowest of Transition metals	Hg	Hg	Sc	Zn	Y	Cn
Highest of Noble Gases	Rn	Rn	Rn	Rn	Kr	Xe
Lowest of Noble Gases	He	Ne	He	He	Xe	Uuo
Highest of Halogens	At	At	I	At	F	I
Lowest of Halogens	F	F	F	F	At	Uus
Highest of the Oxygen Group	Po	Po	Po	Po	O	Te
Lowest of the Oxygen group	O	O	O	O	Po	Uuh
Highest of the Carbon Group	C	C	Pb	Pb	C	Sn
Lowest of the Carbon group	Pb	Sn	C	C	Si	Uuq
Highest of the Boron group	B	B	Tl	In, Tl	B	In
Lowest of the Boron group	Tl	Ga	B	B	Al	Uut

What are the most common valence of most elements is the following groups:

Alkali metal                1      Alkali earth metal       2            Halogens       3               Oxygen group 4                    Nitrogen group      5              Carbon Group       6        Boron group            7     Noble gases             8             

Fill in this chart

	Name	Discoverer(s)	Use	Atomic number	Most stable isotope #
Na	Sodium			20
Al	Aluminium			13
Ra	Radium			88
O	Oxygen			8
Ti	Titanium			22
Po	Polonium			84
K	Potassium			19
Pb	Lead			82

Okay so the format of this isn't very aesthetically pleasing.  This was an online scavenger hunt we did in class.  We went through it to familiarize ourselves with the periodic table of elements.  Most of that is pretty useless information though.  All I really need to know about the elements is what they are and where they are on the periodic table.  It doesn't really matter how big they are or what temperature they're gasses at.  At least, it doesn't yet.  This isn't the most advanced chemistry class ever. But I suppose the scavenger hunt was a good way for us to refamiliarize ourselves with the periodic table.  Atoms and such have never been my strong suit.  I understand the terms, an orbital is two electrons, you can fit 8 electrons in most of the highest levels of atoms.  Put that all together and I tend to get a little lost.  But I'm fine as long as I know that noble gasses don't want to bond with anything.

1st Quarter Reflection

I'm still holding out for explosions.  Hopefully this pie chart will change by the end of the semester.

I came into this class (seventh hour, actually) expecting a lot of lab write ups and experimental procedures.  It's probably best that most of our time was spent learning about the ever changing model of the atom and Bohr's obsession with hydrogen seeing as this is the time of year that has seniors (well, seniors like me and my friends) scrambling to finish college applications.  The labs we did for mixtures and light and such were fun and rather easy.

It was actually good to have all of the atom and light wave exposition.  Well, not so much atoms because I've had atomic structure down since middle school, but I'd completely forgotten that light is supposed to be made of photons and that electrons travel as a particle and a wave, which is pretty freaking awesome.

I still don't like the way elements are supposed to be written with their orbitals.  It's hard to keep straight in my head when you're supposed to jump back to s orbitals from d or p or whatever.  Hopefully I won't be needing this information later.  I can recite how many electrons go in which orbital (s=2, p=6, d=10, f=14) but I'll be reluctant to write out any atom except hydrogen (H 1s1)!

I'm pretty sure we're out of atomic structure now that we've taken a test on it though so I should be good. 

I'm gonna go back to watching Code Lyoko now.

Faster than the speed of light?

Sorry light, you're just not fast enough! - The Flash

So this short news clip and article from BBC is going to totally mess up quantum string theory if it's ever proven.
According to the news clip and article particles seem to have been found that can travel faster than the speed of light!  Einstein's theory of relativity claimed that light is the fastest thing out there.  If that's wrong then a large part of the scientific community is going to have to rethink a lot of equations and theories.  Which isn't going to be fun for them but I can't wait to hear about it. Particles traveling faster than the speed of light was supposed to be impossible but if they can prove that these nuetrinos travel faster that the speed of light then it opens up new doors!  Perhaps this would be the step mankind needed to find that one equation that unifies the universe?  That would be too cool, I'd probably die.  What could we do if we could incorporate those findings into technology?  Could we build a TARDIS with faster-than-light nuetrinos?
One of the interviewed guys said something about travelling in time and I stopped listening.  If travelling faster that the speed of light can make me a time traveler then bring on those nuetrinos!

Spectra Lab

There are three types of light spectra; continuous, absorption, and emission.  In class we did a lab to work on spotting the difference between these three spectra.  We took spectroscopes and looked at different types of light through them.  I took pictures through them with my iPad but they don't look the same as if you'd looked through with your own eyes so I have taken spectra drawings from the Chemistry Cat blog by Nikki Salo because she loves me.

First we looked at a continuous spectra, which is just ordinary light.  There is an orange in that ROY G. BIV down there but you can't really see it because orange is stupid.

Continuous spectra from iPad.

My drawing

Next, containers of colored water were placed in front of the light bulb we were all staring intensely at.  First we looked at red light, then blue light.

The colors are in the far top left corner

This is Nikki's drawing of the visible lights from the red light.

This type of spectra is absorption.  The red light absorbed most of the colors from the continuous emission spectra, mostly the blue and purple colors.

As you can see the iPad didn't quite do the colors justice.

Another of Nikki's drawings because I'm too lazy to draw on an iPad.

The blue light was also an absorption spectra.  This light absorbed the orange colors.  The iPad picture doesn't so that some red was still visible but if you've ever tried to photograph something through a spectroscope you'll understand why the images aren't perfect.

Hydrogen emission picture.

Another of Nikki's masterpieces.

Hydrogen light has an emission spectra.  Only certain colors can be seen through an emission spectra because only certain frequencies of light are emitted.  The lines observed through an emission spectra are spaced and more individual than continuous.

Argon's emission spectra through the iPad

Nikki's version of Argon's emission spectra.

Argon has a different emission than Hydrogen.  All atoms have different, characteristic emission spectra.

Mercury emission.

Inspiring artwork.

Mercury vapor was pretty to look at.  Lights are pretty.  It was the same color as a bug zapper...  The iPad picture does a very poor job of showing the emission spectra of mercury but thankfully Nikki's picture makes up for it.

Nitrogen from an iPad's perspective.

I want emission spectra on a T-shirt.

So here we have Nitrogen's emission spectrum!  The iPad picture for this was actually pretty cool.  Perhaps some day cameras will be as amazing and accurate as the human eye and I'll have a much easier time in class.  One can dream!

Helium emission!

Nikki's drawing of said emission.

The lines on helium's spectrum was a lot cooler than the iPad says it was but it still looks shiny.  Nikki's drawing will, as usual, provide a more accurate example of the visible colors for helium.

Neon emission according to a lying iPad.

Neon emission from my friend!

The last cathode light we looked at was neon.  The iPad doesn't show near as many lines as we were able to see with our own eyes through spectroscopes.  It was actually kind of intriguing to compare what I could see from my iPad with what I could see for myself.  Oh technology, you lying inconvenient thing!
And there we have it!  The three spectra!  Continuous spectra, which is a really pretty rainbow, like the kinds the prism in my car throws; absorption spectra, which is when some colors aren't visible because they've been absorbed by the colored light; and emission spectra, the fun way to characterize elements!
I remember doing this lab freshman year.  Only back then we used these things called colored pencils.  You take this 'colored pencil' and you scribble with it on something known as 'paper'.  It's kind of like Doodle Buddy only instead of your finger, you have a stick.

Protons are Quarky

Hank Green on YouTube made a song about quarks, the particles protons and neutrons are made of!  It's a great song called Strange Charm.

This tea.........tastes like.........AS!!!!!*dies*

Atomic Structure!

Augh! Sheesh.  Is that a drawing?  Yes, yes it is.  And I drew it because Mr. Ludwig wants us to cite picture sources and I just don't want to do that yet.  Besides, my tea cups are so cool.  It's almost better than most of my submissions to DeviantArt.  But I digress.
AS is the abbreviation for arsenic on the Periodic Table of elements.  Arsenic's Periodic data is also the reason I have the Periodic Table taped to my wall.  If you'd care to count the lovingly sketched electrons flying around the nucleus you'll count 33, which makes it arsenic because one must assume that 33 electrons means 33 protons.  How do I know?  Magic, but I'll explain it to you.  Eventually.

The picture lives here.

The atomic number, in the top left corner of this picture, is the number that represents how many protons are in the atom.  The protons are the positively charged particles in the atom.  So, for arsenic, there are 33 protons.  Elements are neutral, so there are also 33 electrons in this atom.  Electrons are the negatively charged particles.  Neutrons are the neutral particles in the atom.  The atomic mass, which is the number underneath the word arsenic, is the added total of the mass of all of the electrons, protons, and neutrons.
The protons and neutrons are clustered together to for the nucleus of the atom.  The electrons travel around the nucleus in paths called orbitals.  But, the atoms are very tiny so you can't see any of this, which means you wouldn't be able to see an arsenic atom if I put it in your tea.
Unlike protons and electrons, neutrons aren't restricted to the atomic number of their element.  It's not uncommon for elements to have more neutrons than electrons.  When this happens it's an isotope of the element.  Isotopes will have a different mass and a different number of neutrons from the original element but the protons and electrons will be the same, making it the same element.
And that's really all anyone needs to know about elements ever.

Nothing but Mixtures

What happens when you mix sugar, iron shavings, calcium chloride, and chunks of marble?  Nothing really, it just makes it hard to separate, which was the only reason we were mixing them together.

My expert chemistry team and I mixed the following:
Calcium Chloride: 3.69 g
Marble Chips: 2.11 g
Iron Shavings: 6.28 g
Sugar: 12.20 g
Watching the other team separate them: Priceless

Yeah, yeah, it was a cheap joke but lists are just so droney and the priceless gag always breaks the tedium.

But I digress, after we switched beakers with another team the first thing we observed about our beaker was the calcium chloride sitting on top. So, we grabbed a screen and sifted the calcium chloride out of the iron and sugar.  The amount of calcium chloride we measured for the other team was 8.82g.  They measured 8.84 so it was accurate.
The sugar and iron was a bit trickier.  We tried running a magnet through the mixture but the sugar stayed stuck to the iron.  So we measured the sugar and iron together and came up with 14.17g.  After we took our measurements we mixed the sugar and iron in water until the sugar was completely dissolved and sent the mix through a filter in a funnel over a flask in order to isolate the iron filings.  We measured the iron at 9.11g and subtracted the measurements to find that the sugar was at 3.09g.  The other team's measurements for their sugar was 3.11g, close enough.  But, the measurement for the iron fillings was 4.51g, which is pretty far from 9.11g.  But, I'm pretty sure that my impatience is what skewed the measurement.  I didn't wait until the iron was completely dry to measure it so there was quite a bit of water still stuck in-between the filings.
All in all, the lab was really interesting.  Using the physical properties of the different elements inside the mixtures to separate them was a fun experiment.  Because calcium carbonate was much larger than the iron and sugar we were able to simply filter it out.  Sugar stuck to iron but it also dissolves in water, which is the best way to separate it from the iron filings.  Having even a basic knowledge of the physical properties of different substances is all it really takes to separate a mixture.

PART 2

Chromatography!

The colors were so pretty...

The chromatography experiment showed us the physical properties of colors.  What were the colors made of?  How could we tell?
For this lab we used a sheet of filter paper, markers, paper towels, and petri dishes.
First, you take the markers and scribble whatever you like on the filter paper. Then, you pierce a hole in the filter paper and shove a rolled up piece of paper towel through the hole.

Cover the bottom of the petri dish with a bit of water and place the filter paper with its paper towel 'wick' over the petri dish so the end of the paper towel is touching the water.

Then the waiting......
........
Oh look the water has spread through the paper!

The water traveled up through the wick provided by the paper towel and spread through the filter paper, taking the different parts of the ink with it.  The permanent marker stayed but the other types of markers were separated into different sections, with the yellow colors closer to the center because the particles are heavier or bigger, and the smaller, lighter blue particles are taken all the way out to the edge by the water.
These labs were very interesting and a lot of fun.  Not as much fun as blowing stuff up, but that comes later I'm sure.