Learning Intentions
- To learn about the major states of matter and how they can transition from one to the other.
Media
There 3 most common states of matter are solids, liquids, and gases.
Another common state of matter is plasma, which occurs in hot fires, lightning, neon signs, plasma TVs, and stars. Since stars make up over 99% of ordinary matter in the universe, over 99% of the ordinary matter in the universe is a plasma.
There are also other, much less common, states of matter such as Bose-Einstein Condensates that only occur in very rare conditions.
The Bose Einstein Condensate is used in a lot of memes as a complicated state of matter.
There are states of matter that are almost never discussed.
Angela Collier listed this meme as 1 of 5 common physics jokes.
Melting Point
The melting point is the temperature at which a substance will melt from a solid to a liquid. For example, the melting point of water at sea level is about 0
°C.
Touching Gallium (0:49)
The triple point of water occurs a little above 0 °C, at a very low pressure. In this state, water is in an equilibrium where it is a solid, a liquid, and a gas at the same time. In the following video, there is boiling (liquid to gas), freezing (liquid to solid), and melting (solid to liquid) occurring at the same time.
Triple Point of Water (1:54)
Beautiful footage of a bubble freezing at -35 °C (0:50)
Boiling Water Freezing in Mid Air (Michigan, -30 °F) (0:21)
How Boiling Water Can Turn Into Ice (National Geographic) (1:27)
The Rock – A body can vaporize? (0:49)
Waterloo in Winter – Windshield Water Deposition
Slava Ivanov is a photographer who has created beautiful timelapse videos of ice crystals depositing from a gas to a solid.
Worksheets
Worksheet – Introduction to Matter