Field of Science

Carbon Dioxide Curiousities

  • It won't burn.
  • No matter how cold you make it, you can't turn it into a liquid at atmospheric pressures.
  • It sublimes, going directly from a solid (dry ice) to a gas (one way to make very creepy fog).
  • It's heavy. Burning 1 gallon of gasoline (weighing about 8 pounds) produced 25 pounds of CO2.
  • You can make a supercritical fluid out of it - a state of matter that is neither solid, liquid, nor gas.
  • It's a critical ingredient in chocolate chip cookies - produced in situ by the reaction of sodium bicarbonate and the potassium salt of tartaric acid.

2 comments:

  1. Supercriticality is the most fascinating property of CO2 at once it is an environmental demon and a putative savior!

    db

    ReplyDelete
  2. I love SuperCritical Fluids!
    In fact, related to my profession, I've opened a blog about supercritical fluids.

    ¿do you know that natural sources of supercritical water exists?

    C.U.!

    ReplyDelete


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