Hot Science Experiments Posts
How To: Build an overhead water rocket launcher
Curious about rockets? In this seven-part tutorial hosted by a science teacher, learn how to build your very own overhead water rocket launcher with simple tools you could find around town.
How To: Make a ball of plasma in a microwave
There are about fifteen states of matter: solid, liquid, gas, plasma, et cetera. Plasma is commonly found in stars, and is a rare natural phenomenon here on Earth. In this video, I show you how to make artificial plasma in your microwave.
How To: Make an Iodine Clock Reaction at Home
In this video, I'll be demonstrating how anyone can make their own iodine clock reaction with simple over-the-counter chemicals.
How To: Make Water Freeze into Ice Instantaneously
Have you ever seen water freeze instantly? This "Quick Clip" shows some of my personal experiences with making instant ice using a bottle of water supercooled in a freezer.
News: DIY Toys Made From Trash + 100's More Easy Tricks & Experiments
Arvind Gupta is an Indian educator and inventor who makes whimsical, elegant toys from simple and inexpensive materials. His site has hundreds of free project tutorials, with simply outlined instructions in the categories of science, math, astronomy and more. Below, peruse the video gallery and images for a selection of Gupta's inspiring work.
How To: Dissect a chicken for an anatomical look
Failed out of veterinarian school? No problem, just watch this video tutorial on dissecting a chicken (avian) to get you back on your feet. This demonstration and lecture of is by an eminent anatomist that will show you how to do it correctly.
How To: Isolate the sugar in a can of soda
In this video from ScienceOnTheBrain we learn how to isolate the sugar in a can of soda. To find out how much sugar is in soda, pour a can into a pot and boil it until all the water is gone. You will be left with the sugar, and then you can weigh it. First weigh your pot before pouring the soda in. Now boil the soda on the stovetop. When the water evaporates, you'll be left with a syrupy sugar. A can of soda has 39 grams of sugar in it. That equates to about 7 1/2 teaspoons. Fruit juice conta...
How To: Make oxygen from permanganate and hydrogen peroxide
C For Chemistry delves into the chemistry of science experiments. This chemist knows what he's talking about. These chemistry experiments are not only fun, but very educational for all of those interested in scientific chemical reactions and properties.
Make Slime Without Borax: 5 Easy Recipes for Gooey Homemade Ooze
One of the only things I remember from watching Nickelodeon as a kid is the epic green slime. Looking back, I don't know what was so great about it, but every kid my age thought that being drenched in slime would be the coolest thing on earth.
How To: Make boric acid from borax
This is a video tutorial in the Education category where you are going to learn how to make boric acid from borax. For this experiment you will need borax (disodium tetra borate) and conc. hydrochloric acid. Take 25 ml of hydrochloric acid and dilute it with 75 ml of water. Next take 6 - 7 gms of borax and dissolve it in boiling water. Now add equal amount of hydrochloric acid. Crystals of boric acid will start forming. They are completely insoluble in cold water. After about half an hour, fi...
How To: Create a thermite reaction
Obtain finely powdered iron oxide (rust), aluminum, and a thin strip of magnesium. Mix them together in a 8:3 ratio (iron oxide: aluminum) in a ratio by weight. [Note that the since aluminum is so light, it will appear that it is about a 50-50 mix by volume].
How To: Do this quick foot experiment to trick your brain
This week's experiment has made the rounds through the Internet as a strange trick, but there is science here too. We are going to use the science of complex systems to confuse your body. To try this, you will need:
How To: Sugar & Sulfuric Acid — A Cool Chemical Reaction
Sulfuric acid is mixed with sugar, which is attacked by the acid. The final products are carbon, water vapor, and sulfur dioxide gas.
How To: DIY Ninja Turtle Ooze! Make Your Own Radioactive Canister of Glowing Green Slime at Home
There's a broken canister of mutant ooze leaking down into the sewers! But don't worry because this sticky slime is non-toxic, and it's so easy to make, a three-year-old can do it!
News: Build Your Own Oscillating Wave Machine
Transverse wave motion is the beautiful rippling effect that occurs when a moving wave causes oscillations that travel perpendicular to the direction of energy transferred. (For example, via Wikipedia: "If a transverse wave is moving in the positive x-direction, its oscillations are in up and down directions that lie in the y–z plane.")
How To: Make sulfuric acid - electrochemically
You already know how to make sulfuric acid with the metabisulfite and oxidizer method and you saw how to make copper sulfate from copper and sulfuric acid, so now try making sulfuric acid with these two in mind… with sulfuric acid by electrolysis of copper using an inert anode.
How To: Make an alcohol lamp
In this science tutorial video, learn how to make a simple lamp from household materials. This lamp is great for power outages and other stuff like camping. All you need is some type of alcohol (isopropyl, ethonal, or even vegetable oil), a pair of scissors, a jar with a lid, and a cotton ball. Make your own alcohol lamp with this instructional video.
How To: Instantly Ice Soda into a Frozen Slushy
In this Quick Clip, I'll be showing you how a supercooled soda is transformed into a slushy "slurpee" in under 4 seconds. I was inspired to do this little soda trick by The Super Effect's video on YouTube from a few years ago.
How To: Make a Crazy Zigzagging Stream of Water Using a Speaker
Sound waves are a lot more versatile than you'd think. For starters, you can use them to project images onto a bubble and liquefy gummy bears. And now, YouTube scientist and optical illusionist extraordinaire Brusspup shows how sound waves can also be used to manipulate a stream of water into a zigzag shape.
How To: Make lightning using everyday household materials
Make lightning and generate tens of thousands of volts in your own kitchen at home using ordinary household objects! Mr. G demonstrates the amazing Triboelectric Effect and explains the electron exchange via adhesion and separation that makes it all possible.
News: The Art of Simple Science
Why does the world work the way it does? Linda Dong takes basic scientific principles and translates them into beautifully simple, explanatory images.
How To: Make iodine easily
In this video, we learn how to make iodine easily. You will need potassium iodine and sulfuric acid to make this. First, add the acid into the potassium iodine slowly. After you add in each part, swirl the beaker slowly so it gets mixed together. After you have added in all of the potassium, you will place this into a beaker filled with ice water while you add in more, because the mixture gets really hot. When finished, you will end up with a mixture that is iodine and nothing else. Fill with...
How To: Properly balance chemical equations
In this video, we learn how to properly balance chemical equations. You will see what substances are in each side of the equation. You will then need to count the atoms that are on each side of the chemical equation. Once you write down the number of atoms on each side, you will need to even them out. To do this, you need to change the coefficients within the equation. These change the total number of atoms inside of a chemical. Once you do this, you will add more to each atom present and the...
How To: Use a protractor to measure the height of any object
In this video, we learn how to use a protractor to measure the height of any object. First, attach a level to the protractor, followed by a straw at the 45 degree angle. Next, walk back form the object while looking through the straw. Keep walking back until you spot the top of the object through the straw, then measure to the base of the object. After this, you will have an isosceles triangle that has two equal sides. Use these sides to help find what the size of the object is. After this, a...
How To: Do a yeast experiment to see how much C02 it produces
In this Education video tutorial you will learn how to do a yeast experiment to see how much C02 it produces with different types of food. Yeast is a fungus and it has to eat. After it eats, it produces CO2 gas. The bubbles in bread are produced by the CO2 gas from the yeast. Take five different types of food items and measure out the same quantity for each item. In the video it is 8gms of cookie, oil, flour, salt and sugar. Take six glasses of water and mix one packet of yeast in each glass....
How To: Make a Sugar Snake with Sulfuric Acid and Sugar
Sugar (a carbohydrate) is dehydrated with concentrated sulfuric acid. Since a carbohydrate was once considered just hydrated carbon, if you remove the water, carbon would be left over. The acid rips the water out of the sugar and the heat generated by this reaction causes the water to turn to steam. A black mass of carbon is produced.
How To: Build a DIY electromagnet for cheap
This video shows the viewer how to make an electromagnet using common items. This is done using a broken microwave, a spool, a cordless drill, a battery and a coat hanger. The microwave transformer is dismantled and the enamel insulated wire is removed. Using the cordless drill the wire is then coiled around the spool. The iron coat hanger should then be cut into small pieces and placed in the middle of the spool. It should be secured tightly. The battery was then connected to the wired coile...
How To: Make fire water or "Negative X" (Zn, NH4NO3, NaCl)
C For Chemistry delves into the chemistry of science experiments. This chemist knows what he's talking about. These chemistry experiments are not only fun, but very educational for all of those interested in scientific chemical reactions and properties.
How To: Make glass mirrors with silver nitrate
Watch this science video tutorial from Nurd Rage on how to make a mirror silvering solution from silver nitrate, ammonia, sugar, and sodium hydroxide.
How To: Use a Volumetric Flask in the Chemistry Lab
Find out how everything in a chemistry lab works, from pipettes to burners to recrystallization to storage. You'll get precise instructions on how to work and perform certain scientific duties in the chem lab, whether it's chemical or just ordinary high school science.
How To: Make a plastic bottle fly into the air
Greg Swanson and Joe Kelley demonstrate their superb skills at creating bottle rockets on rooftops.
How To: Use a Peltier module to create free electricity from heat
A Peltier module allows you to turn heat into electricity. Because you can place it in areas that are normally warm anyway, the electricity created is "free" in a sense, though it does work best when one side of the module is cold and the other is hot. In other words, all you'll need for this project is the Peltier module and a cooler surface such as soil or water, and a warm area such as a well lit window or warm pan.
How To: Perform electrolysis with pencil lead
See how to do electrolysis of water with graphite (lead from a pencil). The positive side has oxygen bubble, and the negative side has hydrogen bubble. Just get a 9V dry cell battery.
News: 10 Amazing Optical Illusions
This video is compilation of ten amazing optical illusions: Rooftop Illusion, Color Illusion, Motion Binding Illusion, Crazy Wire Illusion, Duck-Rabbit Illusion, Silver Egg Illusion, Anamorphic Illusion, Water Illusion, Animated Optical Illusion.
How To: Make a Paperclip Float on Water
This quick video demonstrates the classic experiment of making a paperclip, or multiple paperclips, float on water.
How To: Launch a Camera into Space (On a Shoestring Budget)
Earlier this month, Adam Cudworth, 19, launched a camera attached to a weather balloon into the edge of space. Battling tough winds, freezing temperatures, atmospheric pressure and tumbling speeds, the teenager from Worcestershire, England was able to capture these amazing pictures of the Earth's upper stratosphere. How to Send a Camera into Space
How To: There's Metal Hiding in Your Pepto-Bismol and Here's How You Extract It
Got an upset stomach or a little heartburn? America's favorite pink pill will cure it right up. But did you know that there's actually metal hiding in those chewable Pepto-Bismol tablets? Yes, metal. Technically, it's a poor metal, but metal's metal, right? Well, we do tend to eat a lot of iron in our diets, because it carries oxygen throughout our bodies, so consuming metallic minerals isn't anything abnormal. But you'd never think that Pepto-Bismol is actually made up of metal.
News: This DIY Passion Fruit Battery Can Power Lasers!
It's been proven over and over that you can make batteries out of fruits and vegetables such as lemons, potatoes, and even apples. Turns out, passion fruit is also acidic enough to power a battery, but Maui Makers member Ryan K decided to take it a step further by adding a laser. Passion fruit, or Lilikoi as it's called in Hawaii, is usually over-abundant in Maui, so Ryan decided to put it to good use. Using anodized bolts, copper pipe, wire, switches, and some LEDs, he built a battery that c...
News: Dissecting a Human Head Through Anatomical Illustrations
Human anatomy is something every physician must undergo as a medical student. Some move on to become great doctors, some move on to become great artists, helping to better educate students and improve upon many illustrated representations of the human body since the days of medieval medicine. But thankfully, you don't have to be in the medical profession to enjoy the beautiful art of the human body created for teaching purposes.
News: Fluorescent Puppies You Can Turn On and Off
Always wanted a fluorescent dog but didn’t want to commit? Well, here’s your solution. Researchers at Seoul National University developed fluorescent puppies that only glow when you want them to. Just inject the special pups with doxycycline and they’ll glow like a black light poster for a few weeks. Then, they return to dull, furry normal.