Flower in the sky!!! ^ ^

Still remember Olympic 2008 in Beijing?!!

In the Olympic opening, Beijing used fireworks with the shape of footprint bring us to the stadium from Tian An Men. Then, before all the performance start, amazing, and great fireworks colored the whole dark sky.

An olympic symbol was shown in the sky by using flowerworks!!!

The opening ceremony!!!

The footprint fireworks

The formation of fireworks actually is based on the theory of combustion. There are 6 major ingredients in the composition of fireworks:

Fuel

Fuel is use to start the fireworks through combustion. Fuel used in fireworks is charcoal, which also known as black powder in pyrotechnic industry. Normally, fuels that use in fireworks will contain organic element such as charcoal or thermite.

Fuel in fireworks is to lose electrons to atoms within the oxidizer and releasing atoms from the oxidizer. During this process, between fuel and oxygen will form a bond and produce a product which in stable stage. However, only a little amount of fuel-oxidiser compound required to start the combustion. After fuel-oxidiser compound start combust, it will produce and release solid mixture liquefies and vaporises into the flame of ignition.

Oxidizing agent

The function of oxidizing agent is to produce oxygen needed for mixture inside the fireworks to burn. The most commonly oxidizers are nitrates. Nitrates are composed by nitrate ions ( NO₃^-) with metal ions. However, the most common oxidizer is potassium nitrate; it will decompose to potassium oxide, nitrogen gas and oxygen gas.

2KNO₃ → K₂O + N₂ + 5/2 O₂

From the equation above, we can observe that nitrate just releases 2.5 oxygen out of 3, so because of nitrates never release off all available oxygen, the reaction would not vigorous. In fact, nitrates not use in star explosions because the reactions of nitrates do not produce high enough of temperature to energize more colourful metal salts.

Chlorates, which contain chlorate ion ( CIO^3-). It gives out all oxygen in the reaction, in fact it will have more explosive energy and produce about 1700 to 2000^˚C temperature.

2KCIO₃→ 2KCI + 3O₂

Although chlorates have an extreme explosive, but it is very dangerous to handle because it is less stable. This is because chloride atom have the potential to form bond with four oxygen atoms but now it just bond with three oxygen atoms, so made the chlorine atom become unsaturated and non-stable. Instead, perchlorates are now been use in fireworks because it is more stable than chlorates and also release all the oxygen.

Perchlorates contain perchlorate ion (CIO^4-) and each chlorine atom is bounded to four oxygen atoms which bonded with the maximum number of oxygen atoms, therefore perchlorates are more stable than chlorates.

KCIO₄ →KCl + 2O₂

Reducing agent

The next element of fireworks is reducing agent. Reducing agent is use to burn with the oxygen that provided by oxidizing agent to produce hot gasses. Normally, sulphur and carbon would be used as reducing agent.

S + O₂→SO₂
C + O₂→CO₂

Regulators

By following, regulator like metal that add into fireworks is to control the rate of reaction by speeding up or slowing the reaction. Based on collision theory, the larger surface area will increase the rate of reaction. So, the larger surface area of metal will increase or speed up the rate of reaction. Therefore, the finer the powder of metal, the faster the rate of reaction.

Colouring agent

As we seem that the fireworks at Olympic got a lot of colour, so to produce different types of colour, different types of metal compound would be use in fireworks. In addition, different amount of energy release when reactions occur will characterized the colour of fireworks.

When higher energy released, it will correspond to shorter wavelength and the characteristic of colour will located on blue region of the visible spectrum. While the other way round, lower energy will correspond to longer wavelength and located on orange colour of the spectrum.

The metal compound and wavelength of colour of fireworks are listed in the table below:


Binders

The last element is binders. Binders are used to hold mixture of the fireworks together in a lump. There are two main elements used as binder, which are dextrin that dampened by water and shellac compound that dampened by alcohol. The binders actually do not begin work until it found that the fireworks has been lit and unstable for storage which potentially dangerous.

Hope the next olympic will more amazing and wonderful!!! ^^

Monster VS Alien

Monster VS Aliens

"Jelly Bob" seem like very love jelly and hope it be his girlfriend

Do you watch monster VS Alien???

Inside this show, there are 3 main characters; the either one is in blue color. Some of my friend said that the one is snot, but I think that is a jelly lah!!!(heheh^^) So i called it as "jelly bob".

As u saw that in monster VS alien, the “jelly bob” can move around and when it step on by a monster it still can re-shape back the original shape. So, let us back to our real life, of course a jelly can’t walk and can’t be so powerful, but to make jelly into a shape, a thickening agent is needed. If without thickening agent, jelly will collapse and not firm. Normally, pectin is use as thickening agent in jelly.

Pectin has a complex structure with a linear chain of α-(1-4)-linked D-galacturonic acid polysaccharide backbone, hologalacturonan. The structure of pectin consists of homopolymeric in majority and partially methylated poly-α-(1→4)-D-galacturonic acid residues.

At the same time, the region of galacturonic acid can be replace by α-(1→2)-L-rhamnosly-α-(1→4)-D-galacturonosyl, and the side chain of neutral sugar will branch off. Besides that, pectin also have a structure type called rhamnogalacturonan II, which is a less frequent complex. This type of side chain can be containing other residues such as L-fucose, D-xylose, D-apiose, 3-deoxy-D-lyxo-2-heptulosonic and so on so forth.

Pectin can be found in some fruits like apples, oranges, strawberries, plums and so on. The approximately levels of pectin in fruit or plant can be calculated:

Apple – 1-1.5%
Cherries – 0.4%
Orange – 0.5-3.5%
Carrot – 1.4%

To extract pectin from fruit or plant, some steps can be taking on:

1. Add and immerse hot diluted acid that around pH 1.5-3.5 to the plant and wait for several hours for extraction.
2. When the protopection of plant loses some branching because of bond breaking, the chain length will mix with the solution.
3. Filtered the solution then concentrate the filtrate in vacuum.
4. Then, the filtrate will precipitated by adding ethanol or isopropanol.
5. Separate alcohol-precipitated pectin and dry it.

Do you still remember the “jelly bob” inside the show is blue in color???



Now, to dye a jelly into different kind of color, some coloring agents are needed. As known that different types of chemical or compound use will produce different color. The table below show different types of chemical compound and the color:



So for blue colour, Indigo carmine and brilliant blue FCF are use. For Indigo carmine, it will cause for some allergic, thus not much of product will use this chemical. Therefore, let us discuss about brilliant blue FCF.

Brilliant blue CFC, under commercial names is known as colorant. It is denoted by E number E113 and has a colour index of 42090. In addition, it is a synthetic dye derived from coal tar. Brilliant Blue FCF is described as the sodium salts.

It consists essentially of disodium alpha-(4-(N-ethyl-3-sulfonatobenzylamino) phenyl)-alpha-(4-N-ethyl-3-sulfonatobenzylamino, cyclohexa-2,5-dienylidene) toluene-2-sulfonate and also together woth sodium chloride or sodium sulphate as the principle uncoloured components. Sometimes, calcium and potassium salts are also permitted. Besides, it can also appear as an aluminium lake.

The chemical formation of Brilliant blue FCF is C₃₇H₃₄N₂Na₂O₉S₃




Although in our life we saw that a lot of things especially food, that are colourful and very beautiful, but colouring agent actually is not healthy to our body. Some artificial colouring agent will also cause some allergic, asthma and others side effects. Therefore, for our health, we need to be aware to our surrounding lure!!!

Just like the show, the 3 characters try their best to protect their country from attack of alien. We will act as a defender to stop off any alien “bacteria” and “bad things” enter our body and protect our body.

Now H1N1 quite serious in Malaysia and also in the whole world, take care yourself!!!

My orchestra timpani

My orchestra performancec at 13-6-09

We invite an international singer for our performance

This is me while playing the super expensive timpani^^


This is what i am playing

I am a Chinese orchestra member. Last year, our Chinese orchestra bought a set of timpani for Malaysia Chinese orchestra competition. Fortunately, we won the second metal in Malaysia. (^^) The set of timpani we bought about RM50000, it is a huge amount. So to take care well for this set drum, we bought “Hippo” to ensure there is lesser humidity around the drum because the set of drum will spoil under a very humidity environment. “Hippo” is a brand for dehumidified product.

There are many types of drying agent been used. For example magnesium sulphate. It has a high capacity and complete drying in rapid. Whereas the capacity is refer to how much water per gram that the drying agent holds. The disadvantages of this drying agent is it normally will available in powder form and must filtered out, because magnesium is a very strong Lewis acid and not inert to all functional group. The other example of drying agent is sodium sulphate. This type of drying agent has the similar capacity of magnesium sulphate but in slower rate. It has an advantage is less reactive and in granular form which can remove from liquid easy. But commonly, granules calcium chloride (CaCl₂) are used to be as a drying agent.

Calcium chloride is a common salt which solid at room temperature. It behaves as a typical ionic halide. It can be produce directly from limestone, but large amount are also produced as a by-product of the Solvay process. So because of its hygroscopic nature, it must keep in a tightly-sealed container.

Bonding between calcium ions and chloride ions

Calcium chloride is a compound between chloride ions and calcium ions. It can serve as a source of calcium ions in solution. Furthermore, it will form precipitation because many calcium compounds are insoluble.

3 CaCl₂(aq)+ 2K₃PO₄(aq)→Ca₃(PO₄)₂ (s)+ 6KCl(aq)

Besides that, molten CaCl₂can be split into calcium metal and chlorine gas by electrolysed.

CaCl₂(l) →Ca(s) + Cl₂(g)

To prepare calcium chloride by Solvay process, sodium carbonate will be use to react with hydrochloride acid.

CaCO₂)(s) + 2HCl → CaCl₂(aq) + H₂O(l) + CO₂(g)

Calcium chloride anhydros powder

Based on the strongly hygroscopic properties, air and gases can be channelled to calcium chloride to remove moisture. But, it cannot be use to dry alkaline gases like ammonia gas because some additional product will form and that is dangerous. Moreover, calcium chloride can also add to liquid to remove suspended or dissolve water. The dissolving process is a highly exothermic and it will produce temperature around 60^˚C in rapidly. Therefore, it is known as drying agent or desiccant. It is converted to brine as it absorbs water or water vapour from substances to dry:

CaCl₂+2H₂→CaCl₂.2H₂

So, when place the dehumidified container which contains granules calcium chloride for few days, we can observe that the granules calcium chloride become lesser and liquid form substances are form.

To ensure the super expensive timpani are safe and never be disturb by naughty “humidity” in the air, many dehumidified container are placed around the timpani. (haha)^^

NO WATER!!!

A Talk with dirt and cloth!!!

Dirt: Hello cloth, I feel so proud to meet you.^^
Cloth: Oh my god, I felt so sad to meet you…T.T
Dirt: Why? you should happy because you have a new friend and you don’t think you can chuck me out.( laugh in one's beard)
Cloth: Who say can’t?
Dirt: Me…I’m a pertinacity dirt and not like normal dirt. I’m the king of dirt.(hahah)
Clot: You’re too puerility! Now, my big brother detergent is coming now to clean away you this dirt! Even though is god of dirt also needed to run away. So before he come, you better run away from me now!(laughing)(hahah…)
Dirt: Don’t scare me, I won’t leave away!!!!



Finally, detergent was rescue the clot and kills the dirt. The white cloth returns back into pure white in color!!!














Soap and detergent



Soap and detergent are chemicals that can be remove strains in our cloths. Both are salts of a carboxylate groups. For the salts of carboxylate group, normally it will have 12-18 carbons. Besides that, carboxylate group are amphiphilic which containing a hydrophilic head and hydrophobic tail. As a matter of fact, soap and detergent have slightly different in functions and the chemical structure. For soap, they do not have charged group at the end of the molecules, just like –COO^-, Na⁺. In other hand, for detergent it normally will end with a polar sulfate ion and form soap-like micelles in water.








Structure of soap


























Structure of detergent











Micelle in water




















Micelle in water






The mechanism of how soap and detergent remove dirt actually is the same.


1. When soap or detergent pours into water with a dirt cloth, the ons will move freely.
2. At the same time, soap will reduce the surface tension of water to cause the wetting of greasy surface.
3. The hydrophobic part of anions will dissolve in the grease and penetrate into the greasy stains whereas the hydrophilic part will still remain in the water. This form an image of micelle.
4. Now, the greasy stains are surrounded by the negatively charged head of soap anions.
5. By the movement of water and rubbing, scrubbing or heating, the grease together with the soap anions will loosened and lofted off the surface of cloth, this is because the force of attraction between water molecules and the negatively charged head of soap on the grease surface.
6. Now, the grease coved by negative end of anions becomes suspended in the water.
7. Agitation of water will break up the grease into smaller droplets.
8. Droplets of grease will repel each other because of the negatively charged covered to their surface.
9. When rinse the cloth with water, grease droplets will be remove.

Although the mechanism of soap and detergent to remove dirt are the same, but there are different in different type of water, especially in hard water. Hard water is an aqueous solution that presents of mineral salts, for example calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), iron (Fe) and manganese (Mn).

When soap pours into hard water, a sticky insoluble soap scum will form when calcium ions or magnesium ions react with soap. For example:

2C₁₇H₃₅COO^-(aq) + Ca²⁺ → ( C₁₇H₃₅COO)2Ca(s)
Insoluble calcium stearate (scum)

2C₁₇H₃₅COO^-(aq) + Mg²⁺ → (C₁₇H₃₅COO)2Mg(s)
Insoluble mgnesuim stearate (scum)

After the scum form, it will reduce the amount of soap available for cleaning. In addition, the scum will clings to the object and make the cloth dirtier. But there are different in detergent, detergent won’t form any scum with ions in hard water.

Soap and detergent have their own advantages and disadvantages also.

For soap:

- It is biodegradable, which does not cause any pollution to the environment.
- It is clean effectively in soft water.
- It does not clean effectively in hard water.

For detergent:

- It is effective in soft and hard water.
- It is highly soluble in water.
- It is cheaper then soap.
- It is non- biodegradable.
- The softening agent (phosphate) in detergent will cause water pollution.


So....what should i use now???Is it a soap or a pollute detergent???


!!!OH MY GOD!!!

Why petrol so expensive!!!Help!!!

I hate take ktm every day!!!every day need to pack with a lot of people and need to spend a lot of time for waiting train and travel(the train very smelly also). Just because of the prices of petrol ( $..$..) , my mum forced me to take train every day and don’t allow me to drive to school. Haizzzzz…..( T.T )…..(super tired and super boring lol….)

First of all, let me explain that what fuel is. Actually, fuel is a chemical thing which uses for transportation, heating, cooking and generate electrical energy. It is a means of storing energy which can be released when needed and the amount of energy can be store in a given mass or volume of fuel which called energy density. Furthermore, fuel is derived from cruel oil, crude oil is a black, viscous and with foul-smelling liquid. It is composed by about 100 different types of hydro-carbon molecules. Besides that, the boiling point of the hydro-carbon is increase with the molecular mass.

But we can’t straight away take out petrol from crude oil,(fool also know that lah…@.@) we need some process and machine to aid it. To derived petrol from crude oil, it need to go through a process call fraction distillation which using a gigantic distillation tower. Fractional distillation process allows the separation of crude oil by using the different temperature and molecular mass. For the lowest molecular weight compound, it will collect at the highest column, by the increasing of molecular weight and boiling point; the compound will be collect separate at various stages lower on the column. There are many types of product those in results of fractional distillation and different in functions:

Based on research, most of the barrels of crude oil are converted into fuels. About 40% are converted into gasoline, which also known as petrol; 30% - 35% will converted into fuel oil for heating; 7% - 10% for jet fuel and 5% are for petrochemical industry which for produce drug and plastic. Moreover, the left will be converted into lubricating oil, greases, and liquefied petroleum gas and so on.

Petrol is derived from crude oil, and then crude oils are derived from the natural resources in the earth! Then why our petrol is becoming expensive and more?(WHY???) That is because the crude oils are become lesser and lesser! Based on our knowledge, crude oil is non-renewable sources thus once it have been derived completely, there are no crude oils in this earth anymore! So, when the crude oils become less and less, the price of product of crude oil will become higher and higher just like petrol. In addition, the forming of crude oil is within a long period, which more than million years, therefore crude oil will become more rarity. To face the exhausting of crude oil, scientists are trying to find out the other materials that can replace crude oils. Furthermore, reduce the price of fuel also. (So what are those???)

In this era, many types of chemical materials had been invented; one of it is ethanol fuel.(Ethanol not just use for cooking only meh? can use as fuel also oh?) Ethanol fuel is ethanol, which also defines as ethyl alcohol; it is under the group of alcohol. In chemistry, alcohol is any organic compound in which a hydroxyl group (-OH) is bound to a carbon atom. The general formula for alcohol is C_nH_2n+1OH. Moreover, alcohol can be divided into 3 major subsets, which is primary, secondary and tertiary, and it is based on the number of carbon atom is bonded to. Back to ethanol, C2H5OH, it is a colorless and volatile liquid, besides that ethanol also a saturated alcohol. Use ethanol as a fuel is actually begun from Brazil and later on ethanol fuel is oxygenate to gasoline in United States. Ethanol fuel is easy to manufacture and process, it can be derived from very common crops such as sugar cane and corn then by using fermentation process. In sugar cane contains glucose, which created by plant through photosynthesis:

6CO₂ + 6H₂O + light → C₆H₁₂O₆ + 6O₂

Then, during the fermentation process, glucose is decomposed into ethanol and carbon dioxide:

C₆H₁₂O₆ → 2C₂H₅OH+ 2CO₂ + heat

Furthermore, when ethanol in vehicles, the combustion reaction will make a reaction between oxygen and ethanol then produce water and heat:

C₂H₆O + 3O₂ → 2CO₂ + 3H₂O + heat

The heat will help to generate the engine while water will discarded as waste product. In fact, the waste products of ethanol fuel are more harmless then carbon monoxide which discard as petrol waste product. Carbon monoxide will pollute the air and also affecting human healthy. In addition, ethanol fuel are more cheaper then petrol fuel because ethanol is a renewable resources, and sugar cane are plant in large amount in Brazil and Japan, in fact the prices of ethanol will become cheaper. Thus, using ethanol fuel is more and better then petrol. ( But why Malaysia still haven’t have this kind of technology? T.T )

Beside ethanol fuel, hydrogen also another type fuel that can use as car fuel . Hydrogen is a colorless, odorless, tasteless and high flammable diatomic gas with the molecular formula H₂ with a hydrogen bond, it also a chemical element with atomic number 1 and represented by a symbol H. Moreover, hydrogen is very electropositive so that it can combine with all elements just except noble gasses. There have various type to produce hydrogen:
In laboratory, Hydrogen usually is prepare by reaction between acid or bases on metal with Kipp’s apparatus:

Zn + 2 H⁺ → Zn²⁺ + H₂

2 Al + 6 H₂O + 2 OH-→ 2 Al(OH)₄^- + 3 H₂

Electrolysis of water also a method to produce hydrogen . When a low voltage current pass through the water, oxygen gasses will form at anode while hydrogen gasses will form at cathode:

2H₂O(aq) → 2H₂(g) + O₂(g)

Normally, hydrogen are prepare in the most economically ways which remove hydrogen from hydrocarbon. Commercial bulk hydrogen is usually produce by the steam reforming of natural gas. At high temperatures (700–1100 °C; 1,300–2,000 °F), steam (water vapor) reacts with methane to yield carbon monoxide and H₂:


CH₄ + H₂O → CO+ 3 H₂

Other important methods for H2 production include partial oxidation of hydrocarbons:

2 CH₄ + O₂ → 2 CO + 4 H₂

There is much type of ways to produce hydrogen, if want the price of hydrogen fuel in cheaper than the cheaper and most easy process must be taken. ( every one also hope to get the cheapest fuel lah…:p)Lastly, hope the price of petrol can be reduced or other type of fuel can be promote to all Malaysia citizen. No need worry more and stress more about the price of fuel. (Hope…..)