jdurg

Interesting. Didn't realize that a mercury cathode produced that much of an overvoltage to allow sodium to reduce over H+ ions. (-2.71 to -0.41 is a HUGE overvoltage. Much more so than the one that allows chloride to react and form chlorine gas over oxygen).

Even in an amalgam, water would be present and you wouldn't accomplish anything. When you electrolyze something, the most easily reduced ion gets reduced at the cathode, and th emost easily oxidized ion gets oxidized at the anode. What you make the anode/cathode out of doesn't really matter. When you have a sodium ion in an aqueous solution, the H+ ions are ALWAYS more readily reduced than the sodium ions. This is why sodium does not form in a reaction. When you electrolyze salt water, you're not forming chlorine gas at one side and sodium metal at the other, then having the sodium metal immediately react to form H2 and NaOH. What you are doing is oxidizing Chloride to Cl2 and reducing H+ to H2. The OH- ions are simply left behind and what you end up with is NaOH. In a non-aqueous environment you COULD use mercury as a cathode and get sodium metal to amalgamate there, but only if you have something like a molten NaCl "bath". Realistically speaking, you just can't get sodium metal to form in an aqueous environment.

Haven't gotten a chance yet. (Too many things to do at work and outside of work due to the Christmas season). I do know that he got them at some auto parts store so they probably aren't "THAT" special.

Hehe. After waking up this morning, I'm happy that I did the moral thing last night. It's nice to know that I can think with my brain and not with my hormones. Still, I am wondering why different concentrations of alcohol affect one's personality so much. A little bit and they are happy, a lot and they are either REALLY happy, REALLY pissed, or REALLY depressed. Chemically, I'd like to know why that's the case. (I am fully aware of the fact that it affects various parts of your brain, but I still haven't found a site that goes into detail about HOW it affects the different parts of your brain. I.E. why does it take a higher concentration of alcohol to affect the function of certain parts of your brain? Don't all parts receive the same blood flow?)

Okay, I'll admit right now that I'm pretty inebriated. I just got home from a social event where I had a few drinks to get me feeling REALLY happy, and was fortuneate enough to not have to drive tonight. While I was out tonight, I began talking with this one woman from work whom I've had a "attraction" to for quite some time. She was inrcredibly intoxicated tonight and offered me some things that I normally would kill for. Because of my, but mostly her, intoxication I turned down these offers. After getting home, I decided to have a few more drinks. My six Bass beers at the social event have now been topped off with about four ounce of Jack Daniels' Single Barrel Scotch Whiskey. At the moment, I feel REALLY buzzed and very happy with myself, while my basic coordination is shot and typing is a real chore. (I'm at my "happy drunk" phase). My question is "Why does drinking change one's personality so much?" If I have a few drinks, I become really happy and wanting to get to know everyone. Yet if I have any more, I tend to become morose and angry with the world. Why is that? Is it a physical thing, or a psychological thing? Currently, I'm a bit upset that I turned down the sex that was offered to me, but since I was drunk and she was as well I didn't feel right going through with it. I guess it means I've matured as an individual, but a certain part of me really wishes I went through with it.

Niobium is a neat little metal. I'm almost tempted to take my niobium coin and break it out of its air-tight capsule just to let it oxidize a little bit. It would make it more interesting as a metal, but having unoxidized niobium is something I'm happy to have.

Nitrous oxide inhalatin is pretty dangerous. I've done it before when I was a 'nothing can kill me, all risks are worth it' college student. The problems with N2O is that you can inhale too much without realizing it, and suddenly suffer from heart failure and respiratory failure. N2O is an anesthetic. It causes your brain to "slow down" which results in a loss of sensation in your body. Basically, it knocks you unconcious so you don't feel pain. The problem with N2O is that if you inhale too much of it, it can stop some vital processes such as breathing and heart beat. Many people also combine the inhalation of N2O with various other depressants, most notably alcohol, which increases the chance of a bad incident happening. Personally, I think the 'high' felt while inhaling N2O is incredibly overrated and frankly not worth the risks.

It is possible, but VERY difficult to do. What you have to do is get a LARGE amount of salt (NaCl) and using a source of heat melt the salt until it's a liquid. Once the sodium chloride is molten, you run an electrical current through it and you'll generate sodium metal and chlorine gas. There are a few problems with trying to do this at home, however. 1): It takes a LOT of heat to melt sodium chloride. You need a good torch with a LOT of fuel to do this. 2): You absolutely MUST keep the chlorine away from the molten sodium. At the temperatures used, the sodium formed will be liquid and liquid sodium plus chlorine gas results in a very nasty reaction. 3): The sodium formed is molten, so it will quickly oxidize and react with ANY water or oxygen in the air surrounding it. You will really need to use a dry box in order to ensure that no oxygen or H2O is present. Because of these three problems, making sodium metal is a really difficult process. You can use sodium hydroxide in place of sodium chloride, but molten sodium hydroxide will eat through just about any container you can think of, so it's not a very good replacement. In reality, you're better off just purchasing sodium metal. (Or you could go to a junkyard and look for engine valves. Many automobile engine valves have sodium metal in the valve stems as it's a very good conductor of heat).

Yes, but because Xenon and Krypton are in such vanishingly small amounts, you won't be able to actually concentrate it. (As the one or two picoliters you get will evaporate readily even if it is kept incredibly cold). You need a large amount of air in order to extract the tiny bits of xenon and kyrpton that are in there. No process is 100% efficient, so you have to have a large amount of substance in order to deal with the fact that some of it will evaporate/boil away.

Yes indeed, you have successfully anondized niboium metal there woelen. This is done all the time as niobium is commonly used in body piercings and other jewelery as the metal can be anondized to virtually any color in the rainbow depending on the thickness of the oxide layer. In addition, as you were able to find out, the colored portion is remarkably resistant to chemical attack. So when used as body jewelery, one doesn't really have to worry about it getting destroyed over time. If you come into contact with something that can harm the colored oxide layer, the jewelery would be the least of your concerns.

I think that one also needs to keep in mind that not every single living creature turns into a fossil when it dies. There's a good chance that we don't have fossil records of certain periods because the climate and conditions at that time did not allow for the formation of fossils.

Hmmm. The piece that I used was a fairly sizeable chunk about the size of a mouse pad and about 1/4 of an inch thick. The thing was a ROYAL pain in the but to ignite, but once it got going the thing went pretty intensely. We then chucked it into the shallow end of a lake and the fire kept going and was igniting the hydrogen as it came off. So it does look like you need a large amount of Mg to really get it going. What you may want to try is to get a little misting spray of water and spray that onto the burning Mg. That might produce a bit of a reaction.

If someone takes a plane from New York City to Los Angeles, they are travelling along with 100+ other people and are causing the emission of a scant amount of carbon dioxide. If someone takes an automobile from New York City to Los Angeles, they are putting out a LOT more carbon dioxide into the air thanks to their driving on twisted roads which don't connect the two cities in a straight line. (Therefore, the automobile winds up traveling a longer distance than the plane does and this results in a great deal more pollutants going into the atmosphere). Also, the travel on the roads causes pollution from the breakdown of tires, the failure of car parts, the litter the person will wind up chucking out their car window, etc. etc. In addition, that is just ONE or TWO people going in that car. So take the pollution caused by that one car and multiply it by about 100. Flying is a LOT less polluting, and more efficient way of traveling.

Sodium Dodecyl Sulfate may be another possibility, especially if he's into soap making.

I'll have to ask my buddy what the price was for the valves he bought. He was pretty pissed to have that one get damaged (hence the heaving into the wall when it was bent) so I can't imagine that they are cheap. However, it is now a valid source of sodium metal to those who can't otherwise get it. Perhaps it would make a trip to a junkyard worth it? (As once cars are "junked", the engine and valves are typically garbage anyway).

This completely shocked the living hell out of me. Earlier tonight, I was helping a buddy out with a project he was doing on his car. His goal was to replace the standard engine valves with some higher performance valves to increase the horsepower and he asked me to help him out. I oblidged and went over after to work to lend him a hand. As he was taking one of the valves out of the box, he dropped it on the cold concrete floor and then something unexpected happen. The lead mallet that was sitting on the table next to the work area got knocked over and fell down onto the valve, bending it a bit. My buddy was a bit pissed at this series of events and slammed the now useless valve against the wall. I guess he hit the corner of the wall because a crack showed up in the valve stem. We thought nothing of it and just chucked the valve into a corner. A few seconds later, we both heard this little hissing sound coming from that corner. When we went over to take a look we saw a water droplet come down off a hot water pipe over the corner and onto the valve. When the drop hit, the valve started hissing right at that little crack. Wondering what the hell that could be, I asked my buddy if I could just cut open this broken valve. He said 'sure' so I took a hacksaw and cut it open. Inside was a decent sized lump of sodium metal!!!!!!! I took some tongs, ripped out a small chunk and threw it in water. Sure enough it fizzed, hissed, popped, and burned with a bright yellow-orange flame. I don't know why it was in there, but they have sodium metal inside engine valves. I kid you not. I don't know if it's inside EVERY engine valve, but in these high performance parts it sure is.

The main toxic compound resulting from the metabolism of acetaminophen is N-acetyl-benzoquinoneimine (NAPQI). This compound is quite toxic and is produced by the liver whenever acetaminophen is metabolised. Normally, there are plenty of other enzymes and proteins in the liver which can bind to the NAPQI and render it harmless. However, when combined with alcohol or long term alcohol use, the toxic metabolite is unable to be bound to these specific enzymes/proteins and instead bind to the liver itself. Glutathione is the main compound which can bind NAPQI and render it harmless. Excessive alcohol consumption can basically deactivate the Glutathione and allow the NAPQI to simply destroy your liver.

The generation of singlet state oxygen is pretty neat, as is the reaction between acetylene and chlorine gas. In addition, using light to initiate a hydrogen/chlorine reaction is pretty impressive too. One of the most interesting experiments I've seen/done is when you fill a container with a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen gas, then take some platinum wire and warm it up in your fingertips. With a VERY long set of tongs, you then take the platinum wire and submerge it into the H2/O2 mixture. Almost instantly, the H2 and O2 ignites without any spark or source of ignition. (The Pt catalyzes the reaction almost instantly).

Methyl mercury is VERY lipid soluble, and your brain is composed of a LOT of fats. Basically, the compound is able to cross the blood-brain barrier without any trouble at all, and then it breaks down into the mercury ions inside your brain tissue. Any compound that can easily cross the blood-brain barrier is considered 'toxic'. Heroin works in a similar manner. The structure of heroin allows it to cross the blood-brain barrier without any problems, and then once it does cross it breaks down into morphine. So heroin allows morphine to reach your brain without any trouble. Methyl and dimethyl mercury are able to do the same thing. Metallic mercury itself is relatively non-toxic because it will pass through you pretty readily. A one time exposure to some elemental mercury won't do much harm. Very little of the mercury will be converted into a soluble form, so you won't get too much of an exposure. Over the long term, however, those small exposures add up and then you have issues. The bacteria which convert metallic mercury into methyl/dimethyl mercury don't purposely do it. It's just that they absorb the mercury and it winds up being converted through normal metabolical processes. Basically, they 'eat' metallic mercury and 'poop' out the toxic organic forms.

Yeah, Hg2Cl2 is also known as Calomel and has been widely used as a disinfectant for centuries. In addition, the organic mercury compound 'Merbromin' is considered to be a non-toxic mercury compounds because the mercury atoms are very well 'entrenched' in the organic matrix. Short term uses pose no threat to one's health. Over the long term, however, bacteria may break down the compound into one that makes the mercury quite soluble and thusly toxic. Metallic mercury doesn't pose all too much of a problem, but bacteria can convert the metallic mercury into methyl mercury which then poses a problem.

Nope. He means HN3. HN3 is hydrogen azide which is also known as azotic acid. Azides are VERY toxic compounds, but like cyanides they have a very "distinguishable" odor.

My apologies for not being around to help out with all this. I just returned about a day ago from my buddy's wedding down on the Gulf Coast. I spent a good deal of time working on biochemical experiments involving ethyl alcohol, sex hormones, and endorphins. Suffice it to say, the human body is an amazing chemical converter.