Bobby+T


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[|David Blaine: How I held my breath for 17 min]

I decided to watch this video because a actually saw David Blaine on TV yesterday. I was interested in how he does all of his cool tricks and then when doing this assignment, i came across this video. In this video, Blaine explains how he broke the world record for holding his breath underwater after breathing pure oxygen. He first started holding his breath when he was a kid and later, when he was an adult, realized that in his childhood he held his breath for as long as Houdini did. What made him start trying to hold his breath again was a story he heard where a kid was underwater for 45 min and was pulled out with no brain damage. He then talked to his doctors about different ways that he could break the word record for holding his breath. One suggested that he do it in good old magician fashion, using some different ways of getting oxygen into his bloodstream. When none of those worked well, he just decided to actually do it by just training himself and holding his breath. He trained himself each morning by breathing heavily (oxygenating his blood) and then practicing holding his breath. He tried breaking the record for holding his breath on national TV with handcuffs on and without breathing pure oxygen beforehand. He failed and then decided to try for it by breathing pure oxygen beforehand (which is a totally different record). He was ready to break the record and just in a matter of days before he tried for the record, it was broken twice, making the new record 16:32 (which was 3 minutes longer than Blaine had trained for). He went on to break the record under the pressure on national television and held his breath for 17:04 with a final heart rate that got down to just 20 beats per minute (after having it start at 120 for the first 5 minutes). This video taught me that you can do anything that you set your mind to, even if it's tough or doesn't even seem possible. Blaine shows us what amazing things the human body is capable of if you just set your mind to it and work hard and relentlessly to reach your goal (even if you fail the first time just as he did trying to hold his breath without oxygen).


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__Boyle's Law__- Observation- I step on a balloon and it pops. As i step on it, it gets harder until it pops. This demonstrates Boyle's law because as i step on the balloon, i am making it smaller, making it hold a smaller volume of air. As the air particles fit into the smaller space, they collide more, creating more pressure. This is what causes the balloon to feel harder and then pop from too much pressure.

__Gay-Lussac's Law__- Observation- In class we poured liquid nitrogen on a balloon and the balloon shrunk. This demonstrates Charles' law because as the gas particles get colder, they have less energy as they did before, causing them to not run into each other as much, then causing there to be a lower pressure in the balloon. (which is what make the balloon get smaller)

__Charles' Law__- As we let the balloon in the last experiment warm up, it got bigger and returned to its original shape. As the gas is heated back up, the particles gained more energy, causing the particles to run into each other more, increasing the pressure and therefore the volume in the balloon.


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The greenhouse effect is caused by the aptly named greenhouse gases. They cause this effect because when radiant energy hits the earth and warms it up, infrared waves with a higher frequency then bounce back off the earth and are absorbed by the "greenhouse gases" and are then deflected back to where they came from (the earth), causing the waves to then warm up the earth which is known as global warming.

I have heard that the rise and fall of temperatures at the poles are more directly related to the amount and intensity of solar flares than the rise in CO2 levels. I know this next one may sound weird but I've heard it....That cows produce more greenhouse gases (specifically methane) than cars. And will the earth really "end" if global warming continues or is there any way that nature has a natural way of reversing itself (another ice age?)? Greenhouse gases form 3% of the earth's atmosphere by volume and water vapor accounts for about 97% of them.


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1. Water's volume increases when it freezes and becomes less dense (unlike other molecules whose volumes decrease and become more dense). 2. Water has a boiling point of 100 degrees Celsius. Water has a relatively high boiling point for its relatively low mass. 3. Water has a bit higher surface tension than other molecules. This means that any surface of water has some sort of initial resistance to any object that tries to penetrate it. This is what allows water to form rain. 4. Water is a very good solvent. This means that it can dissolve solids very well (this is because of it's polarity). It can dissolve more substances than any other molecule. Water can also be removed after the solid is dissolved. 5. Water has a higher heat capacity than other molecules. This means that it will absorb heat and will not reflect that by a change in temp. until enough heat is added.

Sources: http://library.thinkquest.org/04oct/01590/intro/properties.html http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/chem00/chem00045.htm


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1. Oil spills are cleaned many different ways using many different methods. Right as the spill happens they can either try to burn the oil on the surface (this is called in-situ burning), or a floating rope or barrier that is wrapped around the spill to contain the floating oil. After the oil is captured by the floating barrier boats with vacuums and oil-absorbing ropes go in and soak up the oil. The rest of the oil is spread out using a chemical (this makes it less dangerous because the oil is less concentrated).

2. __Solubility__- The amount of a substance that can be dissolved in a given amount of solvent. __Rate of Dissolution__- The rate at which a solid dissolves in a solution.

__Temperature__ increases the solubility and the rate of dissolution. It increases both of them because the higher energy solvent molecules come in contact with the solid more and can dissolve more solid and faster.

__Stirring__ does not effect solubility but it does increase the rate of solution. It increases the rate of solution because more molecules of solvent come in contact with the solid that is being dissolved.

__Surface area__ increases the rate of dissolution but does not effect the solubility. Surface area increases the rate of dissolution because more solvent can come in contact with a solid that has a bigger surface area, allowing the solvent to dissolve the solid faster.


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__Concentration__- Orange juice (it was the first thing that came to mind, but i think i can make this work...). The less water that you mix with a can of concentrated orange juice, the more orange you will have for a given amount of water. Therefore the more orange you have in a certain amount of water, the more orange flavor comes in contact with your tongue when you drink it (making it taste stronger).

__Temperature__- Coal burning in a fire. Coal does not burn well at room temperature, but burns much better when it hot (pre-heated around other hot coals, in a hot fireplace, or anything else that is hot and could warm it up). This happens because the heat allows the bonds in the coal to break down easier making it require less energy to burn warm coal versus cold coal (giving off more heat).

__Catalyst__- Platinum foil is a catalyst for the combustion on methane in air. Methane takes less energy to burn when it is over platinum foil. This is because the platinum foil lowers the amount of energy that is needed for the bonds in the methane to break and the reaction to happen.

__Surface Area__- Ice melting in warm water. If you had a 5 lb block of ice, it would melt slower as a block versus if it was smashed up into smaller pieces (giving it more surface area). This would make the ice melt slower because there would be more warm water coming in contact with more ice, making it melt faster.


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Wiki Assignment 7: Equilibrium

Come up with your own example of an equilibrium system and relate it to chemical equilibrium. Make sure to thoroughly explain how your example matches with chemical equilibrium.


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1. A concentrated solution has more particles in a certain amount of solvent than a dilute solution which has fewer particles in the same amount of solvent. 2. A strong acid has a weak conjugate base that does not want to give the H+ back after the reaction happens. A weak acid has a strong conjugate base that will give up the H+ back to its conjugate acid after the reaction happens. 3.


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Carbohydrates- 1. Oxygen, hydrogen and carbon. 2. They help store and provide energy for the body to function. 3. Glucose, sucrose and lactose. (many carbohydrates are found in cereal pasta and bread)

Proteins- 1. Oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, and sulfur. 2. Help make up antibodies (for the immune system), ligand transport molecules help transport substances around the body, and amino acids are broken down into glucose. 3 Ligand transport molecules, antibodies

Lipids- 1. Carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. 2. E nergy storage, structural components of cell membranes, and as important signaling molecules. 3. Fats and waxes.

Nucleic acids- 1. Carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and phosphorous. 2. Determines (and stores) genetic information. 3. Gylcol nucleic acid and threose nucleic acid.