What's up with Plasma?

[Peppers]

Hi, just wondering what plasma is and what it is being used for.

[ydoaPs]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma

[Peppers]

Ahhh, thanks I've never really used wikipedia before.

[calbiterol]

It's a wonderful resource.

[Peppers]

Also, since plasma is the fourth state of matter, is there a fifth? In other words, if you heat up plasma even more, what is the next big phase transition that the atoms would undergo? Would nuclear fission occur if matter was heated to extremely high temperatures?

[ecoli]

no fisson has little to do with heat. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_fission

 

edit: note, the important thing about plasma, is that it's not only super heated, but it's also charged

[[Tycho?]]

Also, since plasma is the fourth state of matter, is there a fifth? In other words, if you heat up plasma even more, what is the next big phase transition that the atoms would undergo? Would nuclear fission occur if matter was heated to extremely high temperatures?

 

There are other forms of matter, like Bose-Enstien condensate.

[5614]

You spelt Einstein wrong... traitor! Are super fluids classified as a 5th state?

[Peppers]

Are super fluids classified as a 5th state?

 

Wikipedia says they are! Learning is fun!

[Peppers]

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_of_matter

The most familiar examples of phases are solids, liquids, and gases. Less familiar phases include plasmas and quark-gluon plasmas, Bose-Einstein condensates and fermionic condensates, strange matter, liquid crystals, superfluids and supersolids and the paramagnetic and ferromagnetic phases of magnetic materials.

 

That's a lot more than high school teaches. When would one learn about these different phases in university, and what courses are they usually in, chemistry or physics?