Dry Ice Experiments
Properties of dry ice!

Dry ice experiments are fun. The ice is an interesting substance to play with. If you have had your own experiments and experiences with dry ice and you would like to share them.

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Dry ice is solid carbon dioxide at the temperature of -109.3°F or -78.5°C. The reason it is referred to as dry-ice is because it sublimates at normal atmospheric pressure.

This means instead of melting and turning into a liquid then evaporating into a gas it skips the liquid phase completely and turns straight into a gas. This is useful if you want to keep something cool, but not get it wet. This is why it is sometimes used to transport goods which need to be kept at a low temperature. 

Dry-ice was discovered in the 1800’s as chemists were trying to study the property of liquid carbon dioxide which had to be pressurised to be in liquid state. Then they noticed that when the chamber was depressurised a white kind of snow was left which was dry-ice.

The ice is not poisonous, but this doesn’t mean that it is to be treated carelessly. First of all contact with dry-ice for longer than a second or two will result in burns. That is why it is strongly
advised to wear insulated gloves. Secondly when dry ice sublimates it turns into carbon dioxide gas which is not poisonous, but it does not support breathing. That means that it can displace oxygen and the human body needs oxygen. Carbon dioxide is used in some fire extinguishers
and what it does is displace oxygen choking the fire. This is why it should always be used in well ventilated areas.

dry ice

The ice is sometimes used to make fog for special effects at concerts in movies or just Halloween. Dry-ice also has some interesting uses for example to make ice cream as long as you have food grade ice and as long as you don’t eat the ice it is perfectly fine to eat the
ice cream. You can also put it in drinks and watch them bubble and as a bonus it cools your drink as well.

Dry-ice is sometimes used to make a kind of bomb because it expands so much when it sublimates and results in a really loud sound and water flying everywhere (I would not advise
trying this).


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