Find out more about Nicholls State University Department of Chemistry's recruiting program involving a Roadshow and Field Days and its impact on diversity in the chemistry program.
The floating soap bubble is an impressive experiment that is surprisingly easy to carry out.
The color of a thermochromic system depends on its temperature. The colors of leuco dye-based systems can also be influenced by adding acids or bases to the thermochromic reactions. These can be used to create colorful demonstrations of acid-base chemistry. Thermochromism found in color changing cups can also be used to visualize heat flow, and therefore thermodynamic principles, associated with stretching and contracting elastomers.
Ordinary playing cards can be used in games where the cards model valence electrons in atoms. These games could provide players with a fun and active way to practice counting valence electrons in simple chemical structures.
With a little chemical investigation, you can figure out how Jet-Puffed's new color changing marshmallows work!
The shapes of plastic bottles can be used to represent orbitals. Using various connectors, a bit of packing tape, and a few other more specialized touches can produce large scale molecular models that feature orbitals, sigma bonds, and pi bonds.
Placing dry ice in limewater is a great demonstration to accompany discussions on a variety of chemical topics, including the impact of ocean acidification on marine organisms that depend upon the formation of CaCO3.
Dean Campbell tries to use at least one demo for every class to illustrate concepts described in his chemistry courses. In this post, he includes short descriptions of the demonstrations and props he has used while teaching his collegiate General Chemistry II courses.
Learn the chemistry behind the reaction between calcium carbide and water...melon...?!
This timely post is a perfect fit for the theme of Chemists Celebrate Earth Week 2023! Algae is a rich topic with many possible connections to the chemistry classroom. Algae needs to take in light, carbon dioxide, and various simple nutrients and, though it can sometimes get out of control, can produce oxygen, diatomaceous earth, and other products. It can even fluoresce pink!
