My school has set up a science prize (for an A3 poster, colour, 'giving an explanation of a principle, concept or application of chemistry.') I was
thinking of doing something on methamphetamines, but I decided it didn't fit the brief. Can anyone suggest any ideas that would be interesting to
research/unconventional and would fit the brief?
[Edited on 20-3-2017 by urea1990]Melgar - 20-3-2017 at 14:27
Iodine, the only naturally-occurring catalytic antioxidant. It became essential after the Oxygen Catastrophe, which killed most of the (single-celled) life on Earth at the time. Iodine has 10,000 times the concentration of seawater in
algae and seaweed, because it is so essential for mitigating oxidative stress. However, there is very little iodine on land, so plants had to evolve
their own antioxidants, like vitamin C and vitamin E. And animals like us had to evolve an organ that's initial purpose was conserving iodine, but
now regulates metabolism. (That'd be the thyroid.) This makes sense, seeing as aerobic metabolism would have initially been very risky unless iodine
was present, due to the oxidatative stress it causes. Even now, iodine is the heaviest element on the periodic table that's essential for human life,
and there's research indicating that the FDA required daily intake (150 micrograms) is far below the optimal level. Japanese, for instance, get about
100 times this amount due to their consumption of seaweed, and they have some of the longest lifespans in the world.
Add that you can't buy iodine yourself, because it can be used to make methamphetamine via a reaction that nobody uses anymore. Also, that both this
and phosphorus are two of the most useful elements in chemistry, but are both illegal to buy in their elemental forms. And finally, add that the only
change that this law caused, is that now the drug is being made Walter-White style, by Mexican cartels. It can be made for about ten cents a gram,
and sold (by cartels, in bulk) for ten dollars, then resold for maybe $50 by dealers.
For your reaction, you can make iodine from potassium iodide, by dissolving it in water, then combining it either with any acid and peroxide, or just
adding bleach drop by drop until the solution gets clear (edit: I forgot to mention that doing either of these will cause the iodine to precipitate as
a dark-colored mass at the bottom of the solution. However, you have to be careful about how much bleach or peroxide you add, because too much will
over-oxidize the iodine to iodate, which is water-soluble, unlike elemental iodine). You can buy all the potassium iodide you want on eBay, and doing
this as a reaction just shows how pointless the federal law is.
The principle that you could do it on would be "oxidation", and you can show how easily iodine changes oxidation states, and why this makes it
important to life. Then use iodine as your example, the way the poster you linked to used thalidomide. Also, reference the fact that oxidation
killed virtually all life on Earth at one point, and the planet got so cold that it froze solid for eons, until CO2 from volcanic activity brought
about global warming again. I mean, if you thought the thalidomide event was important and catastrophic, well, the Oxygen Catastrophe was important
and catastrophic by orders of magnitude more.
Incidentally, I could use some more help grinding this axe.
edit2: A3. I guess that means you're in the UK, eh? In which case a lot of this stuff about the federal government obviously doesn't apply to you.
You could still reference the US laws though, and point out how dumb we obviously are.
[Edited on 3/20/17 by Melgar]A Halogenated Substance - 20-3-2017 at 14:29
First, what grade level is this for?
As for ideas, my recommendations are:
1) Recystallization - an extremely useful technique used by chemists and the industry for the purification of chemicals.
2) Fischer Esterification - Dehydration between an alcohol and a carboxylic acid to create an ester. Esters are chemicals that are frequently
synthesized by plants and are in part responsible for their smells and tastes. This process is also used to create artificial flavor and and smells as
well.
3) Titration - An analytical technique that bases itself around using a known quantity of one chemical to determine the quantity of another chemical.
j_sum1 - 20-3-2017 at 14:50
Nah. Don't cheat. But if you can't find some inspiration there then something is wrong.
[edit] added link!
[Edited on 20-3-2017 by j_sum1]JJay - 20-3-2017 at 15:43
You could check to see how fast crushed eggshells (prepared according to a well-documented procedure involving screening for a particular particle
size) dissolve in different soft drinks. You could also check to see how fast animal teeth dissolve in different soft drinks, but this could require a
lot of trials to obtain repeatable results, considered important to scientists.
Booze - 20-3-2017 at 16:54
Maybe you could demonstrate the synthesis of luminol? Luminol is very neat.A Halogenated Substance - 20-3-2017 at 17:55
You could also demonstrate the extraction of chemicals using various solvents such as it is above.
Perhaps you could even do 'salting out' which involves adding salt to a water-organic solvent mixture to separate the organic solvent and water.diggafromdover - 21-3-2017 at 05:18
Destructive distillation of wood or coal.
look up "blue billy" for an interesting consequence of the latter process which your project could duplicate.urea1990 - 21-3-2017 at 06:04
Making a fuel cell is one of my favorites. Cody's Lab (on YouTube) has a video on how to make a fuel cell. It's very easy to make or at least in my
opinion it is very cool. Rhodanide - 23-3-2017 at 05:38
Maybe you could demonstrate the synthesis of luminol? Luminol is very neat.
If he's in school and possibly just starting out (correct me if I'm wrong)
Then Luminol would be quite hard to do. There's like what, five, six steps/ separate syntheses?
I agree with the guy above, Fluoroscein would be better. Easily accessible as well.
