Moontanman Posted January 30, 2016 Posted January 30, 2016 Can anyone help me find some info on sulphur in it's gaseous state? I tried google and either it's a obscure subject or I am not using the correct search parameters...
fiveworlds Posted January 30, 2016 Posted January 30, 2016 It tends to form SO2 sulfur dioxide when in contact with air. Which smells really really bad. We accidentally made it in school once and school was closed for the day.
John Cuthber Posted January 30, 2016 Posted January 30, 2016 "sulphur vapour" gives about 11000 hits on google. What data are you looking for? 1
Sensei Posted January 30, 2016 Posted January 30, 2016 Can anyone help me find some info on sulphur in it's gaseous state? I tried google and either it's a obscure subject or I am not using the correct search parameters... Search for f.e. Disulfur S2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disulfur Trisulfur S3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trisulfur 1
Moontanman Posted January 30, 2016 Author Posted January 30, 2016 (edited) "sulphur vapour" gives about 11000 hits on google. What data are you looking for? I am writing short story and I want to have some idea of what properties a planetary atmosphere with sulphur would have... Think Venus like temps... Edited January 30, 2016 by Moontanman
John Cuthber Posted January 30, 2016 Posted January 30, 2016 Steel would go "rusty" very fast. "The best conditions for observing S3 in sulfur vapor are found at 10 Torr and 440 OC, when it makes up about 10- 20% of the vapor, and gives it its characteristic deep, cherry red color." from http://web.gps.caltech.edu/~vijay/Papers/Chemistry/Meyer-76.pdf which tells you more about sulphur than you are ever likely to want to know. 1
Sensei Posted January 30, 2016 Posted January 30, 2016 which tells you more about sulphur than you are ever likely to want to know. I bought 25 kg of Sulfur to "know more", and make experiments with it..
Moontanman Posted January 30, 2016 Author Posted January 30, 2016 Steel would go "rusty" very fast. "The best conditions for observing S3 in sulfur vapor are found at 10 Torr and 440 OC, when it makes up about 10- 20% of the vapor, and gives it its characteristic deep, cherry red color." from http://web.gps.caltech.edu/~vijay/Papers/Chemistry/Meyer-76.pdf which tells you more about sulphur than you are ever likely to want to know. Thank you John, the story is pretty much written, I was hoping to put some details in it to make it at least look a bit more like science fiction and less like science fantasy but too many details would bog down the story. I was thinking of mentioning some possible or plausible observations about the biochemistry and planetary conditions, cherry red "air" sounds pretty cool! I wonder if such a planetary atmosphere would be transparent to UV, small things like that would be good to at least make it seem plausible as well as exotic. I was going to go with sulphuric acid oceans but it seems that sulphuric acid would not be stable at the temps needed to make sulphur a gas so I will just be vague about some of the details, air pressure conceivably get around that problem but it's not a deal breaker for the story. I'll post it in my blog when i am finished so it can be critiqued. Oh, one of my stories might be published as an animated CGI movie short! Pretty excited about that...
John Cuthber Posted January 30, 2016 Posted January 30, 2016 (edited) "I wonder if such a planetary atmosphere would be transparent to UV" No. Though, come to think of it our definition of UV is pretty much determined by the transparency of the proteins in our eyes and the transparency of the atmosphere. So life on another planet- especially one with lots of sulphur etc- would have a different view on what was "visible" and thus a different view on "ultraviolet". For them, a lot of our "visible" spectrum would be in their "vacuum UV" Edited January 30, 2016 by John Cuthber
Moontanman Posted January 31, 2016 Author Posted January 31, 2016 "I wonder if such a planetary atmosphere would be transparent to UV" No. Though, come to think of it our definition of UV is pretty much determined by the transparency of the proteins in our eyes and the transparency of the atmosphere. So life on another planet- especially one with lots of sulphur etc- would have a different view on what was "visible" and thus a different view on "ultraviolet". For them, a lot of our "visible" spectrum would be in their "vacuum UV" I think the story stands up well without the details being exact, I thought it would be a nice touch, when I'm finished maybe you can critique it and see if it would be better if I included a few details instead of being vague about it. The fact that sulphuric acid would degrade at temps where sulphur would be a gas kinda makes including it problematic and might result in the story being less interesting to anyone who would know the problems with those details. Once you start adding details at the very least they shouldn't conflict with each other. I think I can include sulphur as a breathing gas and not mention what solvent is involved in that same life form... Making up a believable world as different as possible from ours is difficult due to not having any examples to compare, maybe the details shouldn't be included.
John Cuthber Posted January 31, 2016 Posted January 31, 2016 The real problem you face there is that sulphuric acid reacts with sulphur under those conditions. 2 H2SO4 + S---> 3 SO2 + 2 H2O 1
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