• Question: do you like doing cool experiments like blowing stuff up???

    Asked by poisen2 to Adam, Catherine, Karen, Leila, Nazim on 12 Mar 2012. This question was also asked by spencer1x, howcroae1.
    • Photo: Leila Battison

      Leila Battison answered on 10 Mar 2012:

      They’re the best kind! Although not many real science experiments involve blowing stuff up, or it’d get pretty expensive having to replace it all!

      I did geology for a while, and we got to build some really cool volcanoes and work out the best recipe for making lava that flowed or exploded. That got pretty messy, but it was great fun. Baking soda and vinegar with lots of red food colouring is the way forward!

    • Photo: Adam Stevens

      Adam Stevens answered on 10 Mar 2012:

      I like experiments that have a point… and not all explosions have a reason for doing them. It might look cool, but you might not learn anything from it.

      Experiments can be cool without having anything blown up in them. My experiments won’t have much going on visually but I still think they’re cool because I have a little Mars in a chamber!

    • Photo: Catherine Rix

      Catherine Rix answered on 11 Mar 2012:

      I did a chemistry degree, and it was bad to blow things up! I worked with some chemicals that catch on fire if you expose them to air so you have to work under an inert gas like nitrogen. I spent most of my time trying to avoid blowing things up!

    • Photo: Karen Masters

      Karen Masters answered on 12 Mar 2012:

      I did enjoy making rockets when I did that (with some kids in the USA where the rules are a bit different to here). I think that’s the only time I’ve done an experiment using explosives. Mostly my experiments are observing stuff through telescopes, or running computer programmes.

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