Harry_- Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 Hi, I am in secondary school studying chemistry. I chair the school's STEM society and am wanting to give a talk and practical on the elephants toothpaste that you may have seen online. Elephants toothpaste is large amounts of oxygen trapped in soap. To make a plume of this, you use hydrogen peroxide and a catalyst that releases the oxygen at an increased rate such as potassium Iodide (iodide ions are our catalyst). I am wanting to give this demonstration to other students and need to work out the volume of 'bubbles' that will be made so that I do not make too much. I will be using 100 volumes H2o2 Also I understand volume as a measurement of concentration in this case, however a lot of online sources use percentage. Do I take this as percentage by mass or by volume. Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
studiot Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 I've never heard of elephant's toothpaste, though I suppose they must have some arrangement. Have you got a link? % concentration could be w/w, v/v or w/v. Since one phase is gas I would assume v/v. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strange Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 There are loads of articles on this online.They seem to suggest between around 50 and 100ml of hydrogen peroxide. (And recommend safety equipment.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Harry_- Posted September 12, 2019 Author Share Posted September 12, 2019 1 hour ago, studiot said: I've never heard of elephant's toothpaste, though I suppose they must have some arrangement. Have you got a link? % concentration could be w/w, v/v or w/v. Since one phase is gas I would assume v/v. Attached is my practical proposal. It has a link at the bottom that should explain things. Also here is a youtube link : Elephants Toothpaste Experiment.docx 1 hour ago, Strange said: There are loads of articles on this online.They seem to suggest between around 50 and 100ml of hydrogen peroxide. (And recommend safety equipment.) Ok so I have seen these but my plan is to scale it down so each student can have a mini experiment. Also I need to work out the volume I will create as if I make mess my teacher will kille me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Harry_- Posted September 12, 2019 Author Share Posted September 12, 2019 Also I was wanting to let each student do this mini kids version. Here, yeast is the catalyst, does anyone know the exact decomposition reaction which is happening here? https://www.thoughtco.com/kid-friendly-elephant-toothpaste-demo-604164 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Cuthber Posted September 14, 2019 Share Posted September 14, 2019 On 9/12/2019 at 6:07 PM, studiot said: I've never heard of elephant's toothpaste, though I suppose they must have some arrangement. I presume you didn't search for it. Yeast produces an enzyme which destroys hydrogen peroxide. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalase Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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