Now that i know Madison is going to start reading this i will adress it to her!
Hi, Madison! Happy sunday! All the chemical reactions we experimented with this week were quite facinating! Now that we all have a basic grasp on the elemts and ionic bonding, we now an delve into chemical reactions, another important ( and inevitable, things DO blow up!) part of Chemisty.
When we all mixed Clacium with Hydrochloric acid ( as only half of the groups had finished on friday) wek saw gas comming from the bottle, as gas is a common byproduct of a chemical reaction. After testing the gas's combustability, we determined taht the gas was hydrogen and the chloride and calcium bonded to one another forming calcium chloride. The calcium and hydrogen didn't form anythign together because they are both positive elements, and because Hydrogen is diatomic and it can bond with itself, the equation balanced itself in the end.
What was happening was the pull between the clacium and the chloride was stronger tha th e pull between the hydrogen and the chloride, so the chloride bonded ( ionically) with the calcium and the hydrogen to bond with itself asnd become pure hydrogen gas. After becoming both calcium chloride and hydrogen, the byproducts of this chemical reaction were not as harmful as the orginal hydrochloric acid ( whic is a positive Hydrogen bonded with a negative Chloride) whic can bnurn though skin.
Later in the week we began to draw out what happens in a chemical reaction, with the help of worksheets and skill practives. there are several types of rections, single reactionsthat only one element replaces one part of the ionic bond and a double replacement reaction where two ionic bonds swap which element they are bonded two, in the simpliest sense. Combustion reaction ALWAYS produces Water and carbon dioxide, becuase a hydrocarbon reacts with aon oxygen. Synthesis and decomposion reactions are oposites of one aother. Sysnthesis is where two elements form to create a ionic bond. Decomposition is where an ionic bond is broken up into it's elements.
Another important part fo writing Chemistry formulas is balancing the equation which makes sure that the number of atoms doesnt vary from one side of the equation to the other. I had some diffuculty with this nadi asked Harris but ifeel he was quite confused with it himself. Maybe you understand it, Madison, and you can teach me how to do it correcctly.
Lasttly because we are talking about reactions and such, and because i was geeking out about this, i thoughti should share how airbags deploy so quicky. It's actually thanks to a chemical reaction. Inside the airbag chamber ther is noth Nitrogen gas and a gas called Sodium Azide, which is one Sodium Atom and three Nitorgen atoms. Because this is an unstable compound, and Nitrogen is diatomic the littlest ammount of pressure ( say a person flying into the steering wheel, not little but there would be pressure on the air bag then) causes the Nirtogen to bond with itself, causing the airbag to inflate rapidly with nitrogen gas, along with Sodium nitiride ( Na3N). I saw this on a TV show where a guy got blown into the air by sitting on an airbag, and scientists expalined how it was possible and such. I thought it waso ne of the coolest things i have seen on TV in a while!!!
Here is the video of the man sitting on the airbag that Scientists were trying to explain the science behind :http://www.youtube.com/watchv=uUZJkti1A3M
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