Can dirt melt?

[Soulja]

I have a question. What is the chemical composition of dirt 1st of all. Second of all, can dirt melt? And if it does melt what does it become. If it doesnt melt, why not?

 

Thank You.

[fafalone]

In general, oxygen, silicon, aluminum, iron, calcium, potassium, sodium, and other elements in smaller amounts. This varies by location. A large part of topsoil is organic matter (so alot of carbon, etc), from dead plants and animals accumulating over a great period of time.

[fafalone]

Dirt couldn't be melted under normal conditions. Because of it's density, it would burn at extremely high temperatures. To melt it, you would have to increase the pressure greatly.

[aman]

I saw an experiment where a pellet was fired at incredible speed into a pile of dirt. There was a glasslike residue after impact.

It's just another way of melting dirt.

Just aman

[Soulja]

What would it look like melted? And would there be any uses for melted dirt.

 

I know this sounds silly, but i think of things everyday, science could make alot out of anything, u never know, melted dirt maybe the future!

 

[aman]

We can go to the moon and find plenty of melted dirt. Depending on the concentrations of elements they might be easily mined in the future. The starships of the future will not be built here on Earth but in space. WE are going to be a busy bunch of humans.

Just aman

[Radical Edward]

Originally posted by Soulja

What would it look like melted? And would there be any uses for melted dirt.

 

I know this sounds silly, but i think of things everyday, science could make alot out of anything, u never know, melted dirt maybe the future!

 

 

well if you wanted to extract chemicals from it, there are probably far more efficient methods than melting it.

[Soulja]

like what

 

what would be an expirement i could do at a lab (only if possible) that could extract chemicals from dirt.

 

i wanna do it!

[aman]

If you take the kind of dirt called clay and mold it moist. After it dries you can fire it in a kiln and it will become rock hard but brittle. If you take an assortment of many other "dirts" and mix them in water and paint them on before you fire the clay you will get many different colors in a glassy coating. These are called glazes. Take a ceramics course.

If you want to get metals out of dirt, panning like a prospector works because gold is a heavy element. Diamonds are found by pouring dirt over a tray of waxy substance that catches the diamonds but lets the other crap flow over. Other metals can be melted out of special dirts called ores. Some ores need to be treated with chemicals to get the desired elements out. Some need to be heated and then the gasses released are condensed.

What kind of dirt are you considering experimenting on?

Just aman

[programmer91]

In order to create a race of self replicating robots, they would need to obtain the metals and other elements for replication (and self repair) from some place - and dirt being plentiful  could be a solution if processing it made sense.

[John Cuthber]

From time to time, lightning melts dirt.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulgurite

Some components of dirt would burn off or decompose, but the leftover material is essentially rock.

Rocks melt, and if this wiki page is right then they melt at temperatures of 700 to 1200 C.

That's comfortably within the range of a furnace.

I did once see a video of  some research where a team of vulcanologists anted to study how molten lava flows. The realise it was much easier (and safer) to get rock and melt it in a portable metal casting furnace, than to got and look at a volcano.