Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Things I Learnt during CHEMISTRY!
1. I learnt the different methods of separating liquids, solids and gas. Such as simple distillation, fractional distillation, filtration, crystallisation, chromatography and many more. I also learnt how these separation methods would aid in our daily lives and the steps to carry out each method. I learnt about the different apparatus and what apparatus is needed for each method.

2. I learnt how to use which instrument to measure an item. I also learnt the accuracy of each instrument and what instrument is most suitable to measure a certain item. In this topic, i also learnt the SI untils of physical quantities and their abbreviations.

3. I learnt that how to write an Ionic equation and we need to write down the state symbols for each equation. I also learnt that there is a table of solubility of salt that are soluble and insoluble in water. I discovered that when it is an Acid + Carbonate reaction, the ionic equation would always be CO3 2- (aq) + 2H+ (aq) ----> H20(l) + C02(g). And for Acid + Alkaline reactions, also called neutralisation, the ionic equation for any reaction will be OH-(aq) + H+ (aq) ------> H20(l)

Feelings During Chemistry lessons!
1. I enjoy doing the M&M practical as it encourages us to think and have a feel of how SPA is like. The M&M practical also allowed me to have an experience of doing chromatography.

2. After chemistry lessons, i understand how important chemistry is to our daily lives and how useful it will be to us in the future when we are looking for jobs and to think about our future career.

Interesting Facts!
1. Alginic(al-jin-ick) acid that is found in seaweed is useful for keeping cake moist and when added to bandages, it helps to stop bleeding. In recent years, sodium alginate has been used in molecular gastronomy at some of the best restaurants in the world. Ferran Adria pioneered the technique, and it has since been used by chefs such as Grant Achatz and Heston Blumenthal. Sodium alginate is combined with calcium lactate or similar compound to create spheres of liquid surrounded by a thin jelly membrane. It is also used in ice-cream to stop the different ingredients separating. So, the ice creams that we eat know started off as SEAWEED!

Adapted from: Chemical Chaos-Nick Arnold