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Chemistry Facts

Fire Retardant Gels

Ultra-absorbent diapers, the kind that will hold massive amounts of liquids, have been used for years, without a second thought given to the materials within them. Let's face it; those materials ... Continue reading

Liquid Glass Is All Wet

As a liquid changes to a solid, its molecules go from a state of turmoil and chaos to a state of order. As these molecules slow down to form a solid, they arrange themselves into a crystalline ... Continue reading

Old Window Pane

Knocking the NOx Out of Coal

Nitrogen is the most common part of the air we breathe. In fact, about 80% of the air is nitrogen. Normally, nitrogen atoms float around joined to each other like chemical couples. But when air is ... Continue reading

Air is mostly nitrogen molecules (green in the above diagram) and oxygen molecules (purple). When heated hot enough (around 3000 degrees F), the molecules break apart and oxygen atoms link with the nitrogen atoms to form NOx, an air pollutant.

Ozone: Good Up High, Bad Nearby

Ozone is a gas that forms in the atmosphere when 3 atoms of oxygen are combined (03). It is not emitted directly into the air, but at ground level is created by a chemical reaction between oxides of ... Continue reading

The largest ozone hole ever recorded, roughly three times the size of the U.S., was detected September 6, 2000 by NASA's Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer.