Web Videos Show Off the Wonders of Chemistry

Timmy writes "Wired Science has picked ten of the best videos from YouTube and their own show on PBS to highlight the wonderful things chemistry can do. Only four of them involve fire or explosions. The rest range from music videos about the polymerase chain reaction to reactions that repeatedly change color. One shows how to pour sodium acetate stalagmites. Another shows Chris Hardwick giving instructions for building a glow stick while making absurd comments."

Other wonders.

[palegray.net]

What discussion of the wonders of chemistry would be complete without a mention of these nifty advances in the "better living through chemicals" department:

• Methamphetamines [wikipedia.org]
• Methylbenzoylecgonine [wikipedia.org]
• LSD [wikipedia.org]
• Methylenedioxymethamphetamine [wikipedia.org]

Dry Ice Bombs are fun to watch (^_^)

[MacDork]

Too bad the youtube version of this video [google.com] requires you to log in and be over 18...

HIGHSCHOOL CHEM

[kevmatic]

My high school chemistry teacher did the gummy bear combustion thing. Filled the entire room with smoke.

He also did the color-change chemical thing. Its freaky to see in real life.

Ever see the mythbusters about the coke and Mentos? At the end they make giant exploding bubble foam. We did that too.

Man, I loved my chemistry teacher. He probably only got away with all that shit is because he retired that year.

speaking of chemistry videos ***SPOILER***

[circletimessquare]

i've really been enjoying Breaking Bad on amc

high school chemistry teacher gets lung cancer, decides to leave the world without saddling his family with debt, so he begins to make meth

in the episode i just saw tonight

***SPOILER***

he goes into a drug lord's den with a bag of meth. said drug lord isn't very impressed with the man and has put his partner in the hospital. so said mild mannered chemistry teacher, now unafraid of death, takes the "meth" he brought with him and throws it on the floor, hard

it's really fulminated mercury

BOOM

meth drug lord meets fulminated mercury beats any youtube chemistry video i've seen

Re:not easy to get some of this stuff

[gnick]

For me the big problem occurred when I set an entire table on fire in the shed when the old man wasn't home.

For me, one of the most memorable (certainly not the most dangerous or biggest injury inflicted, just memorable) was when my parents were gone and I managed to set fire to the surface of a large jarred candle. Mind you, once all of the wax in a candle is melted and the surface has actually caught fire, water is a bad idea. The wax boils and begins shooting flaming wax balls out. Then the glass shatters. Major bummer and hard to explain when the parents notice the huge charred area on the porch.

I'm curious though, what school the 10 year old goes to.

Los Alamos, NM has a very unique school district. I'm actually torn between moving away and furthering my career or stagnating the career, staying, and viewing it up as an investment parallel to private-school...