Crowley,+Brittany

__**Mentos and Diet Coke**__ One thing that i really thought was interesting was that the explosion that happens when you add a mento to a bottle of Diet Coke was not caused because of a chemical reaction. It's caused because of the way the mento is made with a bumpy and dull surface that makes the soda release tiny bubbles and gas, caussing the explotion! Also, i was surprised to read that when you add an ice cube to a warm glass of soda, it makes the soda lose it's fizz even quicker! This is because the effervescing (undissolved and bubbling out of the excess dissolved C02) increases dramatically. It was also ineresting to me that soda bottles are made carefully without any scratches or roughness. This is needed because if the inside walls of the bottle is not smooth, this can also cause the same effect as the mento in the soda.

Brittany, Good observations! I particularly liked the reference to the smoothness of bottles. 5 stars! MW

I thought that the article was very interesting. The most interesting but the most broad thing that i learned was that there was actually a place where one kilogram was kept secure. I never knew that something used to measure was that important to be kept locked up. Another thing was that people pay money to get things measured or weighed compared against this secure kilogram, if i would want to get something weighed, i never would have known that was an option. Also the thing that surprised me was that the kilogram, that was locked away and kept secure twenty four-seven actually lost weight over time. Therefor the kilogram now needs to be redifined and set to the right weight. I wouldn't think that something that secure would lose weight... ever, especially something that rarely gets moved.
 * __Redefining the Kilogram__**

Brittany, It is amazing to consider how important a measurement standard is to modern society. 5 stars. MW

__**Crude Oil**__ I thought this video was very interesting. Something i didn't know before that i learned was that oil can be made into many different things, including plastic! And also you can get gasoline from the oil. What i thought was interesting was that there is another form of distillation, called fractional distillation. It is also used in industrial ways which i also thought was interesting. The one thing that i knew that was relevant to the class was the actual act of distillation, which is separating components in a solution. In the video, they used crude oil as an example and they separated it's components.

Brittany, Good job! I like your reference to distillation! 5 stars. MW

__**Motion Detectors**__ In the ariticle on motion detectors there were many things that i both knew and learned. One thing that i knew from prier knowledge was that motion detectors are used for many different purposes. They can be used for stores, garage doors, homeowners protection, and also elevator doors. Another piece of information i knew was that Bat's use a form of motion detection, they use what's called echolocatioin. This means that they use echolocation to locate obsticals around them. The final thing that i previosly knew about is that snakes also use a form of motion detection like bats, but this form is called infrared. This means that they can detect infrared light, meaning they can see us even in the dark! Even though there was a lot of facts i had already knew about motion detectors, there were also plenty of things that i did not know. First off i didn't know that there were so many methods of motion detectors. There are three methods, one uses a light source, another an echo, and another listening to the warmth. Also what i thought was intresting and didn't know was that our eyes is a sort of photo sensor or motion detector itself, i thought that was pretty neat. My last fact i didnt know about was that our body tempurature and skin temperature are different. Our body temperature is about 37.0 degrees celcius and our skin temperature is 33.9 degrees celcius. I learned a lot in this article!

Brittany, You sure did learn a lot! Good post! 5 stars. MW BTW you might want to try using spellcheck.

__**Where Do Elements Come From?**__ Chemicals come from stars that release elements in space when they explode, through supernovas. Then, through "successive fusion reactions," other elements can form, the process is called nucleosythesis.

Brittany, Needs a little more wordsmithing - 28 words. 4 stars.

__**Sugar an Unusual Explosive**__ I thought that this article was very interesting to read and the most interesting point that caught my eye was how dangerous a simple substance like sugar actually is. Also i was surprised that sugar can form into powder and be even more dangerous. In class we also learned about combustion and i was surprised to learn that this occurs when you roast a marshmallow over a fire. Another thing in the article that related to what we are currently learning about in class is when we did the pumpkin demonstration. The surface area got bigger and exploded and went into the air, just like the sugar powder. Overall it wasn't a bad article to read and i thought it caught my attention, especially since I'm a big sugar lover!

Brittany, Doesn't it seem that everything we love can be bad for us? :) 5 stars. MW

__**Helium Balloons**__ This article was a easy one to read i thought, i liked how it added comedy to the reading. The most important point was that gas molecules exert pressure in every direction because of their continuous motion. This is the most important point because this is the reason why we have buoyant force and where it comes from. Another important point was that pressure exerted by the atmosphere increases at lower levels of elevation. The last fact that I think is important is that the ability to float is caused by the density of an object, if it is more dense than air, then it will not float.

Brittany, OK. Decent summary. Good point on density. 5 stars. MW