Chemicals found Naturally.

[LawLord]

Was woundering about what type of chemicals can be found naturally accuring in the environment without requiring large amounts of money/equipment to extract it.

 

Hydrogen and Oxygen are two obvious ones.

 

Also, how would one go about distillation of these? Or is water a compound rather than a mixture?

 

Hydrogen has a boiling point of -252.87 °C so I assume there's no point in the usual distillation method.

 

I ask these questions because I'm helping my nephew with his science project (In New Zealand, 11-12 year olds have a "Science fare" where everyone presents their experiments, I assume similar things occur around the world).

 

My friend gave me the idea of distilling salt (which is what he did when he was younger), but sodium chlouride distilled sounds like it would be rather dangerous. Or perhaps in small amounts could be ok? My friend has forgotten how he distilled it so if anyone has any cheap ways to work this, it would be much appreciated.

 

Thanks.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Water is a compound rather than a mixture. I would also be afraid of separating sodium chloride into sodium and chlorine, as chlorine gas is fairly dangerous.

 

It's still fairly easy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen with electrolysis, and you can capture the gases in test tubes or something. I've done that before with some nine-volt batteries.

[LawLord]

electrolysis?

 

I have never heard of this. I'm sure I could find it on the net somewhere but do you have a detailed explanation on how I could go about doing this?

 

Also, with sodium chloride, if it was distilled and the Chlorine gas was caught in a test tube and released in the open air, would that be ok? Then i'd be left with sodium, although I hear that some form of sodium combust on contact with air/water.

[insane_alien]

distilling sodium chloride will not result in sodium and chlorine. they cannot be separated that way. you would need electrolysis.

 

electrolysis is where you apply a DC current to a solution or condunctive substance and collect the constituent chemicals.

 

with a sodium chloride solution, you could gather some chlorine gas but the sodium will react with the water and make sodium hydroxide, this could be shown by measuring the pH of the solution before and after electrolysis.

 

you could also do it with plain water(perhaps some sodium hydroxide thrown in to aid conductivity) and collect the hydrogen and oxygen given off at each electrode. you can even show which gas is which with a flame test for hydrogen and a smoldering bit of wood relit for oxygen.

[hermanntrude]

by the way, if you electrolyse a very concentrated solution of sodium chloride with a 9V battery, you will get some chlorine at one electrode. I did it once, thinking I'd get oxygen but once i saw the yellow bubbles i rushed outside so as not to give my family pulmonary oedemae (sp?)

[DrP]

Electroysis of sodium chloride is done in the molten state and is quite dangerous (especially if you dont know what you're doing) and requires some sturdy apparatus. I really like elemental sodium and would love some for my element collection, but am too much of a coward to produce it from molten NaCl. All too hot and reactive.

[hermanntrude]

dr P i have three pounds of sodium in my laboratory! and 5 g of potassium! also a large tin of red phosphorus. I'm a little scared of that room.

[DrP]

Don't suppose you could bring some sodium over next time your in the UK?...... erm.. suppose not really! I'm thinking of getting Hazel to nick a small bit from Simon for me.

[hermanntrude]

electrolysis?

 

I have never heard of this. I'm sure I could find it on the net somewhere but do you have a detailed explanation on how I could go about doing this?

 

Also, with sodium chloride, if it was distilled and the Chlorine gas was caught in a test tube and released in the open air, would that be ok? Then i'd be left with sodium, although I hear that some form of sodium combust on contact with air/water.

 

I suspect the distillation your friend did was the distillation of salt water, which would result in salt and water, separated. You can't really distil sodium chloride, but like some of the members suggest here, you can electrolyse it, which is a hazardous process and not for someone who is new to chemistry

[DeanK2]

Aside from the actual seperation of chemicals in the air, there are many man made contaminants present, especially at industrialized areas. They will include carbon monoxide.

 

Collect the fumes from a car in a sealed container. In this container, add water, and heat. This is NOT how the majority of acid rain is formed (oxides of nitrogen and sulfur take part in a series of reactions to produce nitric acid and sulfuric acid respectively), and open the container carefully. Add litmus paper to this solution containing disolved carbon monoxide. An interesting demonstration of an interesting molecule undergoing an interesting reaction

[hermanntrude]

Aside from the actual seperation of chemicals in the air, there are many man made contaminants present, especially at industrialized areas. They will include carbon monoxide.

 

Collect the fumes from a car in a sealed container. In this container, add water, and heat. This is NOT how the majority of acid rain is formed (oxides of nitrogen and sulfur take part in a series of reactions to produce nitric acid and sulfuric acid respectively), and open the container carefully. Add litmus paper to this solution containing disolved carbon monoxide. An interesting demonstration of an interesting molecule undergoing an interesting reaction

 

while it's true that CO is often man made, it is also created by incomplete combustion, which happens without man's intervention sometimes.

 

Interesting demonstration.

 

Lawlord, to answer your original question, there are VAST amounts of different "chemicals" which can be extracted with ease.

 

I recently saw a demonstration of someone extracting DNA from strawberries, which was pretty impressive. I expect it's online somewhere