Periodic Table of Videos- Beryllium

Beryllium is an unusual metal many people have never heard of. It is unique because if you put x-rays through beryllium they are not absorbed, they just go straight through. This make beryllium useful for x-ray experiments where scientists want to make a vacuum without the vessel absorbing the rays. Beryllium is very toxic. It is know to cause an industrial lung disease called berylliosis. One small dome of beryllium costs 15,000 Euros.

Periodic Table of Videos- Lithium

Lithium is the lightest of all metals and can even float on water. It has to be stored in oil because it reacts immediatly with water and nitrogen in air. Lithium is used to cure bipolar disorder.

Periodic Table of Videos- Helium

This video is about the element helium, Much like hydrogen, in the fact that it is so light, helium has a few unique properties of its own. It is the least reactive of the gasses, in remains inert when combined with others. Liquid helium cools at a very low temperature. Because of this, liquid helium can change the properties of a material when it is poured over it. For example, it is used to remove electrical resistance. Helium can not be made by humans because it is simply a pure element. Under the US large amounts of helium is formed by decaying minerals.

Periodic Table of Videos- Hydrogen

This video about Hydrogen was very informative. I had not known that hydrogen had an isotope called Deuterium which has twice the mass of Hydrogen due to the extra proton and neutron. When combined with oxygen it makes "heavy water". (It is NOT safe to drink!) While they look the same Deuterium and Hydrogen are quite different in their reactions. Another isotope of Hydrogen is Tritium which is radioactive.

Chemistry Mind Map

This is my mind map for chemistry. As you can see elements play a large part in chemistry. There are chemical properties and physcial changes which I asscoiate with combining elements or compounds.

(NOTE: The category "atoms" fits under all the element categories.)

Nitrogen: Too Much of a Good Thing

Nitrogen in Fertilizers Article

Review of the Article
The above article discusses the element nitrogen, a necessary component of fertilizers but one that has devastating environmental costs. Commercial fertilizer is made up of three elements: nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Nitrogen is by far the most deadly. Most plants cannot process pure nitrogen from the air. Instead, they need nitrogen to be "fixed" so they can process it into energy. Exceptions to this are soybeans, peas and clover. Symbotic bacteria in thier roots allows these crops to take in atmospheric nitrogen (N2). The bactieria breaks N2 down into a chemically usable fertilizer. Fertilizers mainly use ions of N2 such as  ammonia (NH3) or the ammonium ion (NH4+).

Normally, nitrogen makes up roughly 78% of the air. However, excess nitrogen in fertilizers do more harm than good. Nitrogen can leak off from the farmland into bodies of water such as lakes, rivers, and eventually the ocean. This fertilizer triggers algae growth. When they die the algae falls to the bottom of the body of water. Bacteria break the algae down. In doing so, bacteria suck up oxygen from the water. If this occurs frequently in large numbers there is no more oxygen for the fish and marine life to breath. Nitrogen from fertilizers can also be converted into N2O which contributes to global warming.

Reflection

"Jerry Glover, an agroecologist at the Land Institute, and colleagues predict that it will be possible to grow perennial crops within the next 25–50 years."
This is an outrage. We cannot wait another half or quarter of a century to have better industrial crops. Actions must start today. What the article fails to contribute is why farmers overdose the crops with fertilizer. If we are only using 15 to 20% would it not make sense to simply lower the intake of nitrogen. Ideally, the government would limit the amount of fertilizer farmers are permitted to dump on the crops. That way, farmers would save money and save the environment at the same time.
According to Food Inc. (the documentary) corporate food industries hold farmers down by constantly putting them in debt. They tell them they need this new expensive technology or they will not buy their crops. This further puts the farmers into debt trying to get out of it by buying "necessary" technology. The same applies to fertilizers. We pay farmers to overproduce keeping the price of corn low and farmers suffer. Scientists try to come up with new ways to use this excess corn. In all ways this is a suicidal cycle.
Action needs to start now. Firstly, corporate giants and even the government need to stop paying growers to over produce and instead for organic farming. Farmers will be less likely to be motivated to use killer fertilizers and instead go natural. Secondly, we need to kick our addiction to corn. While it may seem natural that everything from batteries to coke has corn somewhere in it this is just destroying our world further. Thirdly, foreign and local sugar should become more avalible. A major product involving corn is high fructose corn syrup found in virtually every manufactured product.

This will all take time and effort. Not everyone may agree. But if we start today then we will definitely benefit tomorrow.

Chemical Party

Chemcial Party

This video shows the different reactions between elements through the use of a humorous script. It informs the viewer of what happens when two or more chemicals come together. Here is a list of what happened:

1. Neon and Hydrogen have zero reaction.
Noble gases do not react with other elements bhttp://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=4387960185330109689ecause their outer shells are full. They do not give or take electrons. Even helium with only 2 electrons in the outer shell is full. Noble gases do not naturally combine with themselves or other elements.
H+Ne = H+Ne

2. Carbon can attract 4 hydrogen atoms in at tetrahedral formation.
Carbon and hydrogen generally have no reaction. Sometimes they form a slight acid between protons.
 1C+4H= CH4

3. Sodium and chlorine have an electric reaction. They can be separated by electrolysis.
 Mixing sodium and chlorine produces common table salt. This is because chlorine has 7 electrons in its outer shell. This means its unstable. Sodium gives it that one extra electron to stabilize it. This creates what you use to salt you mash potatoes. Electrolysis can be applied to divide it back into sodium and chlorine again.
2Na(s)  +  Cl₂(g)  ——>  2NaCl(s)

4.Water and potassium have an explosive reaction.
Potassium is an alkaline metal. When it combines with water it wants to get rid of one electron to form a noble gas. The result is a chemical reaction in the form of an explosion.

 K(s) +2 H₂O(l) à 2KOH(aq) + H₂(g) 

Structure of Matter

Here are several different types of matter found in the natural world. I will hypothesize what it is composed of and how one could prove the components.

The Ocean
Major Components: water, salt, bacteria, algae, plants, fish, coral, sand
How to Test This: Take a sample. Put the water under a microscope to identify the unseen bacteria. Look at the visible components with the naked eyed. Categorize them. Evaporate the water to see if salt is let over.


Sea Water
Major Components: water, salt, bacteria
How to Test This: Put the water under a microscope to look for living things. Evaporate the water to see if salt is left over.

Salt
Major Components: sodium chloride, sodium silicoaluminate or magnesium carbonate
How to Test: Use electrolysis to divide it into sodium and free floating chlorine gas. This must be done at high temperatures when the salt is molten.
Source: http://www.ccmr.cornell.edu/education/ask/index.html?quid=588

Beach Sand
Major Components: quartz (silicon dioxide) , dust, shell bits, salt, volcanic glass powder (depends),
How to Test: Put the sand through a  fine filter. Look at what is left over. Let the sand settle into layers. Examine closely with a magnifying glass.

Silicon
Components: 14 protons, 14 neutrons, 14 electrons
How to Test: Smash one atom together with an atom of a much heavier element and measure how the momentum changes. This will be the mass. To find the number of electrons find the charge of the element by moving it towards an atom of a the same element with the same charge. If there is no charge then there are the same number of electrons as  protons.

Chlorine
Components: 17 protons, 17 neutrons, 17 electrons
How to Test: Do the same as above.

What is the Octet Rule, a Bohr Diagram, and Lewis Dot Diagram?

The Octet rule states that atoms will lose, gain, or share electrons to achieve the electron configuration closest to the nearest noble gas. Every element has one electron more than the one before. When it has 8 in one shell it is full. If it has 9 then one electron goes to the next outer shell. The atomic number lists the amount of electrons a stable atom of an element has.

Source: http://groups.molbiosci.northwestern.edu/holmgren/Glossary/Definitions/Def-O/octet_rule.html

A Bohr diagram is a simplified model to represent atoms. It was designed by the physicist Niel Bohr. In the center is the nucleus, where the static protons and neutrons reside. On the outside, in the surrounding circles representing electron shells where the electrons float around. The Bohr diagram shows difference in charges by having a plus sign for a positive charge, a minus sign for a negative one, and none for no charge.The top illustration shows what it looks like. If there was a neutron it would be in the center with no charge.

Source: http://homepages.ius.edu/GKIRCHNE/Chem.htm

A Lewis Dot Diagram shows the bonding of atoms within a molecule. In the center is the abbreviation of the element. Surrounding it are dots each representing the valance or outer electrons of an element. The central element is the one with the largest amount of electrons or the largest atom. Around the atom go the other elements within the molecule. You place them according to electrons they share with the central atom. (This means that every bond shares two electrons.)

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_dot
            http://antoine.frostburg.edu/chem/senese/101/bonds/faq/simple-lewis-structures.shtml

Green Plastics: The Material of the Future or a Misguided Mistake?

http://vimeo.com/11077939


Response to the Video


This informative video produced by ChemMatters discusses the latest innovation from the scientific community: "bioplastics". It goes on to discuss the chemical composition of these new greener plastics and their pros and cons. Watching this makes me wonder whether all these attempts at more environmentally friendly materials are really worth it. What happened to the simple idea of reducing waste rather that creating more eco counterparts? It takes very little carbon to simplify and cut down on your intake of materialistic items. More stuff even if its supposedly good for the environment does not save the planet. It gets consumers to go out and buy more worthless junk. 


The answer lies in reusable items, which plastic is mostly not. Very few, cloth bags rather than billions of eco plastic ones are better. Further more, this idea of plastic created with vegetables forces motivates farmers to overproduce further destroying the land. Instead of using just plain old sun and water farmers will turn to the most toxic pesticides and herbicides they can lay their hands on. 


In the US the government already supports the overproduction of corn. Because of this scientists look for any product possible to sneak it in. Everything from coke to diapers to batteries contain corn. Bioplastics provide yet another item corn will demand. When we've used up all sources of land in the US we will turn to the precious rainforest. With a combination of cross clearing and soil overuse the world's lungs will be gone.

In addition, producing bioplastic takes almost as much energy as normal plastic. Why waste the effort? The program said in 10 years it could make up 20% of the global plastic. This is relying on the fact that bioplastic would be cheap enough to be globally endorsed. Improvised countries and many of us are not going to pay extra when there is a cheaper alternative. Bioplastic would need to be boosted by government support or private companies. If we keep deluding ourselves that there is limitless oil for normal plastic that is not going to happen anytime soon. By then it may be too late.


 While in theory bioplastic sounds like the savior to our mindless consumerism habits it is not. In stead of coming up with more alternatives we need to change our foolish ways. Bioplastics are idealistic but simply out of the question. Perhaps this will change... in 20 years when the rainforest is gone! While they may seem like the answer, we should not rush ahead with them. Scientists can take them back to the drawing board... for now.


Reflection on the Video




These plastics are being developed by Nature Works scientists who develop the plastic pellets and send them off to factory to process. They are called "green" because they are based on vegetable sugar molecules rather than oil. Some of them are even compostable. This video lists 3 reactions, 2 for normal plastic (ethylene and condensation) and 1 for bioplastics (PLa). Within the process of making PLa there are over four different reactions. I think I see around five or six elements but I am not sure if every molecule is an element . If so, I see around 12. By making all these chemical reactions scientists get byproducts of water. It is a hindrance rather than a help. This shows another amazing quality of water. If making water from molecules is dangerous then how can be processing this plastic be safe?