Acids and Bases

Name of 3 Acids:

• Hydrofluoric Acid - HF

• Hydrochloric Acid - HCl

• Hydrobromic Acid - HBr

Name of 3 Bases:

• Sodium Hydroxide - NaOH

• Potassium Hydroxide - KOH

• Ammonium Hydroxide - NH₄OH

Two Properties of Acids:

•  Acids release a hydrogen ion into water (aqueous) solution 
• Acids turn blue litmus to red

Two Properties of Bases:

•  Bases release a hydroxide ion into water solution  
• Bases turn red litmus to blue

Source: http://www.chemtutor.com/acid.htm
 

What is a Mole?

A mole is a unit of measurement. A mole is the quantity of anything that has the same number of particles found in 12.000 grams of carbon-12. That number of particles is Avogadro's Number, which is roughly 6.02x1023. Amedeo Avogadro, an Italian Physicist, discovered and created the number. He believed that equal volumes of all gases at the same temperature and pressure, contain the same number of molecules.  This hypothesis then led to the concept of the mole and are important and helpful in chemistry because they allow scientists to count a large quantity of something small such as molecules. It also allowed for the calculation of the molecular weights of gases relative to some chosen standard. Avogadro and his contemporaries typically used the density of hydrogen gas as the standard for comparison.

Sources:
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/388062/mole
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/45884/Amedeo-Avogadro

Coupled Biogeochemical Cycles

Coupled biogeochemical cycle is an emerging scientific discipline that looks at how Earth's biogeochemical cycles interact. Researchers are discovering that biogeochemical cycles--whether the water cycle, the nitrogen cycle, the carbon cycle, or others--happen in concert with one another. Biogeochemical cycles are "coupled" to each other and to Earth's physical features. Studying cycles as coupled is more important that studying them as separate entities because the study of coupled biogeochemical cycles has direct management applications.The "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico is one example. Nitrogen-based fertilizers make their way from Iowa cornfields to the Mississippi River, where they are transported to the Gulf of Mexico. Once deposited in the Gulf, nitrogen stimulates algal blooms. When the algae die, their decomposition consumes oxygen, creating an area of water roughly the size of New Jersey that is inhospitable to aquatic life. Protecting the Gulf's fisheries--with an estimated annual value of half-a-billion dollars--relies on understanding how coupled biogeochemical cycles interact.

Bonding Discovery

4 facts:

- this new technique by researchers at North Carolina State University gives scientists new insight into the way silicon bonds with other materials at the atomic level and could lead to improved understanding of and control over bond formation at the atomic level, and opportunities for the creation of new devices and more efficient microchips.
- Bonds are the chemical interaction between adjacent atoms and are what give materials their distinctive characteristics.
- strain makes a difference in how bonds form, but up to now there hasn't been much understanding of how this works on the atomic level.
- Application of even small amount of strain in one direction increases the chemical reactivity of bonds in certain direction, which in turn causes structural changes.

Alloys

Definition: mixtures composed of two or more elements, at least one of which is metal.

Examples:

- Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. It is harder than copper and is more easily cast and it is also used in coinage.

- Steel is the most important alloy today. The principal elements in most steel, in addition to iron, carbon, are, boron, chromium, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, tungsten, and vanadium. Steel has a wide range of useful purposes, such as corrosion resistance, ductility, hardness, and toughness.

Color Vision in Birds

5 interesting things I learned:

-  Raptors, like this Swainson’s hawk, have the most acute avian vision, relying on sight to spot and capture prey from altitude. While most birds have laterally positioned eyes, giving them a broader field of view, raptors have eyes set frontally to give them increased binocular vision and depth perception.

-Diurnal birds tend to have increased ultraviolet sensitivity, with far more cones than rods, while nocturnal species such as owls tend towards sensitivity in the infrared end of the spectrum and have a relatively high proportion of rods.

-One possible advantage of ultraviolet vision is in spotting the traces left by prey. The urine and feces of mice are visible in the ultraviolet range, so they stand out against the uniform color of a cultivated field to the eyes of a hunting kestrel.

-Some species we see as having identical male and female plumage differ when seen in the ultraviolet range - a difference apparent to the birds themselves.

-Migrating birds that fly at night need different navigational equipment. When compared to daytime flyers, songbirds that migrate nocturnally have an enlarged section of the brain, which apparently controls this aspect of migration.

How New Elements are Named

When elements are newly discovered, they are given a temporary name that is derived from their numbers. For the past decades, new elements are generally named for famous scientists. For example, Einsteinium is named after Albert Einstein.