CHEMISTRY IN PICTURES: UNLEASHING THE POWER OF THERMITE
Credit: Yilei Wu
Stanford Chemistry, Lab Manager, Yilei Wu, and Graduate Student, Ben Charnay, were featured most recently in the C&EN Chemistry in Pictures Series on Thursday, November 6th.
Thermite, a mixture of metallic aluminum and iron oxide (rust), won’t do anything at room temperature. Even a burning match or a cannon fuse does squat. But once you get even a small section up to around 1,500 °C (a burning magnesium ribbon or a sparkler will do), the runaway reaction releases huge amounts of heat. Thermite burns at more than 2,200 °C—hotter than molten lava—and yields aluminum oxide and metallic iron. The reaction is used in construction to weld steel and in war to melt through enemy equipment.
It’s an excellent way to teach chemistry students about activation energy and exothermic reactions, says Yilei Wu, a researcher and the director of the teaching labs at Stanford University. Wu and teaching assistant Ben Charnay set up this thermite demonstration as part of an introductory chemistry course called Chemical Foundations and 21st Century Problems.
This article was originally published in C&EN on Thursday, November 6th.