Bonus: How does lightning striking sand create glass? (and other questions)
Hey. I'm Melissa.
Jam:I'm Jam.
Melissa:And I'm a chemist.
Jam:And I'm not.
Melissa:And welcome to chemistry for your life.
Jam:The podcast helps you understand the chemistry of your daily life. Bonus edition.
Melissa:We are perfectly in sync on that one. I wanna go through it.
Jam:I'd even done a little bit of a This thing, we still were in sync.
Melissa:We're still totally in sync.
Jam:It's perfect.
Melissa:Well, Jam, I'm I'm happy for today's questions. They all were really good ones, but I wanna Start with a correction.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:Okay. So this is from our our patron, Tim
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:Yes. Also a high school chemistry teacher. He's getting, certified to teach high school chemistry and my friend IRL. And he also gave a correction on the freezing point episode, which so did we had that same one on our last q and r. Mhmm.
Melissa:But he explained it in a different way that I thought was also helpful. So he said if you add an amount of sugar to water and the same amount of salt, there will be a difference in freezing point depression because the salt Salt dissociates into water, into sodium ions and chloride ions.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:So it's twice the number of particles, whereas sugar doesn't do that to the same extent. So
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:I think I said if you put x or y amount in, it will be the same. Like, x amount of 1 and x out of the other, it will be the same. Right. But he didn't think about the dissociating in water. Right.
Melissa:So
Jam:But what you're talking about was, like, just the collative collocative property and, like, The fact that there is at least some level of of you can change the material and achieve a similar result Yes. And it's not like Only salt can do this or something like that. But okay. That makes sense.
Melissa:Yes. But, like, baking soda, I guess, would dissociate. That would have a similar effect. Yeah. It's more about the amount of the material and less about the material itself.
Jam:Got it. Got it.
Melissa:So that clarified the thing that I was confused on last week or last q and r, so I thought that was helpful. So thanks, Tim.
Jam:Thanks, Tim.
Melissa:Shout out.
Jam:And he's one of our patrons. Did you ever say that?
Melissa:Yes.
Jam:Okay. Sorry.
Melissa:And he is he always comes to our coffee hours. Those are really fun.
Jam:Oh, yeah. Okay. This next one's from Peter f. Here's what Peter said. I just listened to your episode on freezing point or lack thereof.
Jam:First of all, as a Minnesotan, It was very fun to hear 2 Texans talk about letting faucet drip and salting roads in the winter.
Melissa:Yeah. We're like, how does that happen? I don't know how that Have you ever seen that happen?
Jam:He's like he's like those naive Texans. Poor poor Texan. They think they have it bad. I have a follow-up question related to water being supercooled. I've heard that water can also become superheated and thus explode if something's dropped in it.
Jam:However, it sounds like this only happens with distilled water and not tap water. Do you know why this is? Thanks for what you do, Peter f.
Melissa:Okay. So I could speculate on this. This does happen. In chemistry, we call it, bumping, actually, when a fluid is A liquid, I guess, is at the boiling temperature, but nothing breaks the surface tension so the gas doesn't escape. And then if you drop something in it, it will
Jam:Oh, interesting.
Melissa:So we call that We or you don't have to drop something in it. Sometimes that'll just happen. We call that bumping. Where it happens a lot is, We have this thing called a rotary evaporator where you have, like, a water bath and you have a round bottom flask that rotates. Mhmm.
Jam:And
Melissa:so it's rotating, and then The solvent that evaporates off, you know, goes and is collected into, like, a condensing tube.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:And there is a little thing in between called a bump bulb to catch Any if it if it boils over like that Uh-huh. It'll catch it.
Jam:So
Melissa:so that's why we have stirring rods in, like, if you're heating up something so that it breaks that surface tension and doesn't bump like that. And then also that's why If you've ever done, like, a a high school or college chemistry lab and you had to put boiling stones in something, it is the same thing.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:So I don't actually know that if it only happens with distilled water or not, I've seen it happen with all kinds of solvents. Mhmm. But I think it is just about and I would imagine water would be the worst Because it has really good, oh, sorry. I hit the mic. It has really good intermolecular forces that are really strong with those hydrogen bonds.
Jam:Right.
Melissa:So, You know, you've seen water. We talked about the surface tension of water before.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:So I would say it has a strong enough surface tension that could be hard. And maybe distilled water because it has less particles in it, like, less salts in it and stuff like that would have a better ability to interact with itself and not have other things getting in the way. Mhmm.
Jam:But
Melissa:I think it would happen with either.
Jam:Got it. It could
Melissa:be I've seen that happen, but I don't know I guess I don't know a ton. That's just my guess is that it's the surface tension.
Jam:Got it. That's crazy. Wow. Yeah. I never would've thought.
Melissa:Yeah. I guess there's Not as high of a risk of that when you're, like, on an open pot boiling water at home. It's a very unique situation Yeah. Yeah. Where you're boiling water in a Little weird flask or something.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:This next question is from Madeline. Madeline asked, how does lightning Striking sand create glass.
Melissa:Okay. So sand and glass are made primarily of the same thing. Silicon dioxide. So it's s I o two, but sometimes that's also 1 silicone, silica mono Molecule and 2 oxygens. Uh-huh.
Melissa:But sometimes that's just called silica, but it does have 2 oxygens on it. And Sand and glass are both made primarily of that, but they both have other things in them as well.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:And so I'm guessing that when lightning strikes sand, it just heats it up enough to melt it together. Now I then I went and Googled it because that's against my rules for and r's. I try not to do homework for q and r's. It's, like, part of why we went down to doing less episodes is so that I could manage my life a little bit better. But I thought it was interesting because there are some things that go around the Internet that are like, oh, this is what happens with sand straight glass, and it's like These really clean, beautiful pieces of glass also in Sweet Home, Alabama.
Melissa:Have you seen that movie?
Jam:I have not.
Melissa:That doesn't surprise me. He's he says sort of the Same thing like, oh, when lightning strikes or when, lightning strikes sand, it makes this beautiful glass formation. Uh-huh. It does, but It's basically like hollow tubes, and the sand on the outside is kind of stuck to it also.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:So it it does exist, and you can just Google petrified lightning is what they call it. And it it does mimic the The, like, the structure, I guess, of lightning where it has, like, fingers all the way through, and it has these these hollow tubes with the sands on the outside. So it's not, like, really Cute in my opinion.
Jam:Got it.
Melissa:It's called fulgurite, fossilized lightning or petrified lightning. And you can Google it, and it just looks to me like Dirty sand. Here's here's a picture. Here's some pictures of some of it. I mean, it looks cool, And it's also hard to tell, like, which ones of these are fake and which ones of these are real.
Melissa:It looks cool, but one of the most interesting facts I found and this was just from googling, so I did not write these references down. You can Google it as well. But one of the facts I found is that it can stay that can be really intricate networks of this, like, under the sand, and it can stay under there for a long time and not become unearthed.
Jam:Wow.
Melissa:And it's pretty rare to find because you have to have the amount of silica or, quartz in there to make it to make this happen, basically.
Jam:Those pictures looked super cool. I mean Yeah. You're you're right, though. It is not very, like it's not like glass looking at all. Right.
Jam:So it doesn't like, I think if you'd Ask me to picture it or describe what I think it would look like. I would probably describe it as a little bit more glossy, beautiful in that way Yeah. Instead of being like a kinda odd formation. It looks like an odd rock formation of some kind.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:Like like I mean, not like stalactites and stalagmites, but but similar. It's like a little creepy looking in it, but still cool.
Melissa:And that does kinda make sense because if it's really hot enough to melt and fuse this sand that it's directly touching, then it probably is also melting, But maybe not to the same extent so that it's not all clear. Like Yeah. A good amount of sand. So I'm like, how much of the sand is fused into the quote, unquote glass? Yeah.
Melissa:Anyway, so but the basic answer to Madeline's question is that they are made of primarily the same thing, silicon dioxide.
Jam:Interesting. Yeah. Very cool.
Melissa:Good question, Madeline. But it's not the way Sweet Home Alabama makes it look. I know. Who who knew? You can't trust rom coms.
Jam:Yeah. Who would have thought? Shocking. This next question is from Audrey. Audrey asks, How do heaters, air conditioners work?
Jam:How do they immediately heat slash cool the air coming out of the vents?
Melissa:Okay. Also, when Audrey messaged me this, she said, oh, may maybe this is a dumb question. I don't think this is a dumb question at all. And, actually, I don't know the answer. I sort of know an answer, but I don't know the answer, and I think it's worthy of an episode.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:Because that that's a good question.
Jam:I also I kinda feel like we have maybe been asked this in a Q and A before, But I think we may have said something similar, honestly. They're like, we need to, like, delve into it deeper. Yeah. I could be creating that memory, But out of nothing, but something about it seems eerily
Melissa:Sounds familiar?
Jam:Familiar to me.
Melissa:Well, so here's one thing I do know. There's something called swamp coolers, that they use primarily, like, in the desert where it already it cools off at night, so it's not as hard to get the house Cool.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:And it essentially just blows air over water. And that water, because it has a higher heat capacity, which we've talked about, in, like, one of the very first episodes
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:Can basically take in the heat without heating itself up too much and therefore cools down the air that passes over it. Yes. In the same way, you get a cool breeze off of the ocean sometimes. It just cools it down. Yeah.
Melissa:So I know that they have the something like that, Swamp coolers. And when things got really hot was it last summer? There were people making their own versions of this where they would, like, Get a fan and put it like, drill a hole and put the fan going into a bucket and have ice water in the bottom of the bucket. And so the Then air would, like, hit the bucket the ice water and then, like Okay. Come out cooler.
Jam:Interesting.
Melissa:I don't exactly remember why. I've seen that. But
Jam:That's crazy. There's also something similar with heat pumps, which I've I've watched some videos about Is a specific way of doing that using the the earth? Using the, like, the way that the ground can Stay cool when it's hot or be warmer still when it's cold outside, and kinda use it to heat or cool our air a little. And I don't fully understand that, but there's a lot of of interesting, like, science going on there too where they're
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:They're it's more efficient if you Start like, when you're building a new home, for instance, if you were to do that, it'll be more efficient for the long run. So there's a lot of new, kinda companies looking into that kind of stuff, but I still I don't fully understand it. But it sounds like it'd be similar just Yeah. Using the earth instead of water if you didn't have access to, like, An amount of water is more
Melissa:Right. But Well and my husband's grandfather was talking about I guess he went to Alaska, and I don't know a lot about this pipeline, but I guess There's some kind of oil pipeline or something in Alaska Uh-huh. And it's warm. And you can't let it be too warm or it'll hurt the environment like the don't know if it's natural gas or oil or what's piping through it. Uh-huh.
Melissa:But so to keep it from being too warm and melting the snow and, like, negatively impacting the environment.
Jam:Oh, right.
Melissa:They have just, like, these aluminum arms that basically stick up. And he was amazed, but that's enough to cool it down. And I was like, oh, that makes sense because aluminum will take in the heat and lose the heat really quickly. It has a low capacity to take in heat and lose and, like, we'll lose it really quickly. And so it's probably easily taking up the heat from whatever is being warm, and then the wind that's cold is taking the heat away, and it's, like, Actively moving in a way.
Melissa:Yeah. Moving those warm molecules off. So I was like, oh, yeah. That makes a lot of sense to me. But it he was amazed by it, and I had never heard of application, but I was like, that checks out chemically.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:Dang. That's cool. That's gonna be interesting.
Melissa:So I don't know much about it. I've never been to Alaska. I think it's beautiful, But I thought that was a cool application of science, like, in way they engineered basically, chemistry didn't do what they needed it to do.
Jam:That's awesome.
Melissa:That's a really good question, Audrey, and I don't have the answer, but hopefully, I will soon.
Jam:Yes. Hopefully, before it gets too hot around here, we'll have the answer.
Melissa:Oh It was 90 degrees Fahrenheit yesterday.
Jam:Oh, yeah.
Melissa:I don't know what that is Celsius. In the I think at the thirties, It was hot Yeah. Yesterday.
Jam:Definitely.
Melissa:It's already happening.
Jam:1st day of spring of the year or whatever to exceed 90 degrees around here.
Melissa:32. 32 degrees Celsius. So it's close. Hot.
Jam:Thing well done. You'd converted that pretty quickly.
Melissa:I've got a little I've got a scale in my mind of What's what in Celsius and Fahrenheit is from years of having to convert for the lab?
Jam:That's awesome. That'd be very handy. This next question is from Sean f. Sean asks, how does too much salt inhibit yeast growth?
Melissa:Before I answer this question, also, I got sick when I was in Canada.
Jam:Oh, yeah.
Melissa:And the thermometer that we bought there is only in Celsius, and it says you Fahrenheit, but we can't change it to Fahrenheit. Uh-huh. So that added to my, like, list of numbers. Because I'm like, oh, a fever is I think it's 40 something. So I am, like, a fever's in the forties.
Melissa:So That's funny. I sent the I sent a picture of it to Emily, Your wife. Because I thought she'd think it was funny. And she was like, oh, that's all of our thermometers that work are in Celsius too. Oh, nice.
Melissa:So all of us have secretly converted all the scientists and the medical professionals. Okay. Sorry. I just wanted to share that. So Sean asked how does Too much salt inhibit yeast growth.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:Okay. So I've heard that salt will kill yeast. And To me, that makes sense because if the if it works through something like osmosis, if the exterior is so salty, it'll give, Like, the cell or whatever will give up water
Jam:Oh, okay.
Melissa:To balance it out. So so it's too salty outside. Our cells can lose water so that it's this it's sort of reached an equilibrium where there's the same amount of salt on the inside and the outside. So I'm assuming The salt literally it so it kind of dehydrates it. So if you've ever heard of people dehydrating meat using salt
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:It's the same concept. So I'm assuming that's how it kills yeast, but I will say when I was thinking about that to answer this question, I was like, what is Yeast. I mean, I know it's an organism that does something to produce carbon dioxide. Yeah. But that's all I know about yeast.
Melissa:So that was a good question. Sean, you stumped me, but my guess is That yeast has, has some kind of a a cell, and that's why.
Jam:Interesting. That's cool.
Melissa:Yeah. Remember
Jam:I know, like, there's recipes I've done where, like, I made some dough for homemade pizzas one time, and actually a few times. And the recipe I was following Was very specific about when you add the yeast Mhmm. And when you add the salt and a few different things like that. I'm guessing you're trying to get something more because if you were adding yeast to the water and then you added too much salt or added too soon or something like that, Then you probably would just kill it.
Melissa:Even at times, I've heard that you should add the yeast mixture on the opposite side that you're adding the salt so it has some time to work first. But also so I just quickly googled it, and it says that yeast is a single celled organism, and it's possibly in the fungus family, which What are fungi also is something I've been wondering about lately. Like, what distinguishes them from plants versus animals?
Jam:Yep.
Melissa:But If it's a single celled organism, then I think that backs up my guess that some kind of dehydration happens and kills the yeast when it's interacted with salt.
Jam:And part of what I would explain the this area being interesting and little tough is because there's prop there's probably a whole area of biochem that would really delve into some of the stuff over biology specifically. And, obviously, the salt part applies a ton to chemistry.
Melissa:Yep.
Jam:Once you get into, like, how does yeast work and stuff like that, that's probably something you haven't had to
Melissa:No. Anna, sadly, I was going through a tough time in college and didn't pay as close of attention as I wish I had paid in biochem. And now I'm paying for it now. Yeah. So in a different way.
Melissa:Yeah. Yeah. So that's something that I that I Which I knew more about? Yep. So any biologists out there, I know we have some that listen.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:If you, off the top of your head, Could give us some quick feedback about the difference of fungus between animals and plants. I'd love that. And, also, if you wanna tell us how yeast make Our food tastes good. I know they feed on the sugar, and a byproduct is carbon dioxide.
Jam:Mhmm. Like in kombucha.
Melissa:Yeah. Oh, yeah. Is that fungus too?
Jam:Yeah. I guess it's a symbiotic. SCOBY is stands for symbiotic combination of bacteria and yeast. You have, like, a culture of yeast and bacteria that's growing together in there and eating the sugar and creating carbon dioxide and all that stuff. So
Melissa:Did you know that Jam used to make used to make kombucha, and he would call it booch, and I hated it.
Jam:Our friend Ryan was Or the offender of calling a boosh, but, yeah, I did partake. I I in my defense, we made a lot of kombucha and gave all of it away. Mostly
Melissa:That is true.
Jam:So That helped. But, the the yeast, that's my the extent of my yeast experience is the dough I made that For pizzas and, blue chip.
Melissa:Yep. So yeah. And also things. The elephant's toothpaste. Didn't I make you do that one time?
Jam:Oh, yeah. You did. That's right.
Melissa:And it, like, kind of explodes. It gets warm. The yeast helps the juice back. Yeah.
Jam:I forgot about that. That was super fun. K. His next question is from the chemistry guy, which I love.
Melissa:I tried to find his real name, but
Jam:that was
Melissa:all I could find on Instagram.
Jam:That chemistry guy. I'm a chem student. That's perfect perfect name for you, commission guy. I'm a chem student, but, actually, I have no idea where I'm going to work after graduating.
Melissa:Help. That's funny. I really like that. Well, listen. It's tough.
Melissa:I I know people's parents are like, Get a degree in STEM that you can use right away. And I think that's true for, like, the e in STEM Uh-huh. Which is engineering, but I don't think it's true for the s and the m. I guess it's true for the t and the e. Uh-huh.
Melissa:For technology and engineering, you could get you could get straight out of those and have a job. Mhmm. But science and math, it's actually kind of hard to get a job straight out of your bachelor's, a job that you would like. So a lot of times people go into chemistry and math because they like the challenge of it. I guess I don't know math as much.
Melissa:I do know someone who has a degree in math who went into data analytics right away and really loves it.
Jam:Uh-huh.
Melissa:But, for science, everyone I knew who graduated with their chemistry bachelor's and went to work was pretty discontent with that work in industry. They kinda felt like, well, I got this degree because I like problem solving. I like trying new things I you know, that's why I like chemistry, and I feel like I'm doing something that I could have done after I graduated from high school. It's kind of what a lot of them felt like.
Jam:I see you.
Melissa:So a lot of people I know who got degrees bachelor's degrees in chemistry and went into industry came back. Well, some of them were teachers.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:Well, all of them came back and went to grad school so that they could try to do other things. I think people who like to teach, that's a good option.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:Or, if you can get your foot in somewhere that in industry that's satisfying to you, Or you can use your problem solving skills to get a different type of job. We know somebody who has a degree in chemistry who did that. Mhmm.
Jam:Because
Melissa:you learn a lot of skills outside of just chemistry being a chemistry major. A lot of problem solving, critical thinking.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:But, yeah, it's I don't have a good answer for you other than probably you'll wanna go to grad school so that eventually you could get the type of job where you have the freedom to do more of what you like to do, Which is, I feel like, the trick that people don't tell you. Like, I don't think I knew that when I started my undergrad in chemistry that is like, oh, you can't really You can, but you can't get a really good job straight out of grad or undergrad.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:Like, my husband graduated with a degree in engineering, and he Got a really good job. I mean, he got entry level into a company and then got into, like, an engineering position, and He could do that job for the rest of his life and keep moving up in the company, and he makes a very good living salary. And I think it's harder for people with Just bachelor's degrees in chemistry to do the same thing.
Jam:You're right. Right.
Melissa:In computer science, I think they'll have similar things where they can get jobs right out. You can keep going to school, but you don't have to.
Jam:Yeah. That's kinda tough. I mean, that that I guess, all interest is very. It'd be it's kind of annoying that's the case.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:But I guess, there's always that's always the case with different degrees you'll get, different industries you'll go into. It's like, The demand or the level of education where you're really appealing to potential, like, industries you wanna work in or or or places or whatever, the type of guy you wanna do might vary based on how many degrees you need to get, but it's a bummer a little bit.
Melissa:Well and also I know I guess in the sort of come out more in in me looking at graduate education for my research is a lot of times a master's degree isn't really highly valued, but you can get a master's degree and then get more interesting jobs in industry. It doesn't help you a lot in academia. You could teach at community college, which is probably a little bit less time consuming than teaching at high school, but For academia, master's degree doesn't matter as much, but for industry, that really can help you go out and get a career that's more interesting to you, but that's not as Much of a commitment is getting a PhD, but a lot of cases, that's not valued. I wanted a master's degree because I didn't really know what I wanted to do initially, And everybody just told me go for PhD track because those are usually fully funded, and you can switch down to a master's degree, but it's harder to switch up to PhD. So, like, I was able to go to school with a stipend and school is paid for, but master's students didn't do the same thing.
Jam:Right. Right.
Melissa:So And I actually ended up doing that because I wasn't sure if I wanted my PhD in Ochem, and I didn't really like it. So my master's degree was in I like Ochem. I just didn't like the lab and the work itself.
Jam:Right.
Melissa:I liked making fun things when it worked.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:But so, yeah, I think that's a hard question that I don't know how much I can help with. I think It's maybe a a failing of the system that people with bachelor's degrees in chemistries don't quite have the same job opportunities that I think they're qualified for, but that doesn't mean it's not possible.
Jam:Right. Yeah. Interesting. We definitely have talked a lot about 2 other like, the kinds of industries you can go into and stuff like that in previous q and r, been helpful. So we could delve more into that with the chemistry eye, but that's helpful.
Jam:Have you watched the this is a question from David m. Have you watched the MIT open course where introduction to solid state chemistry?
Melissa:Okay. David is one of our most, communicative listeners, and so we get lots of really good questions from him. But, no, what I really wanna do and my work is pretty time consuming right now. And one of the things I've talked, with Jam about some is possibly after my postdoc doing a lecture position that maybe I have a little bit more Freedom to do stuff like this. But what I'm more interested in is food chemistry.
Melissa:I feel like there's so much about food chemistry that I haven't learned a lot about yet that would be so helpful full for the podcast. And I think I did get some solid state chemistry whenever I was in grad school, you know, so that was, like, That was probably enough for me. But I feel like there's so much about food chemistry that I'm still interested and excited, and I know there's a food chemistry course. Don't know if it's through the MIT online videos or the Harvard, I think, has one too. Uh-huh.
Melissa:But so they're also, Mason's doing a software engineering class, I think, or a programming class through one of those. So you can get really good classes online from Really prestigious university. So I kind of wanted to highlight that to our listeners who like learning about chemistry that there are ways that you can do that.
Jam:Yeah. Yeah. It's cool.
Melissa:It's like college level classes for free.
Jam:Yeah. Yeah. There's there's so much out there like that. Or there's stuff that's, like, maybe not say free, but Very, very affordable Yeah. Where it's, like, super good, and there's almost nothing stopping us from learning that kind of stuff.
Melissa:Yeah. I think Mason basically did the free course and then Paid, like, $30 to get access to assignments and have them be graded.
Jam:Oh, wow. That's awesome.
Melissa:Which is really cool. Yeah.
Jam:This next question's from Neil m. What episode should a new listener pick to listen to? Oh.
Melissa:Well, Neil is actually, One of my chemistry friends' spouses.
Jam:Oh, cool.
Melissa:So what's up, Neil? But he so he started listening recently, I guess, just learn more about chemistry and talk to his wife or, like, about it or whatever. Uh-huh. But I was like, oh, that's a hard question. Yep.
Melissa:It's not just what's my favorite, but what's the best one for someone to listen to?
Jam:The one that so I'm often Explain to people what the podcast is, and it's surprising to them because I'm like, I'm not a chemist. So Yeah. I have to do some more extra legwork. Whereas, like, if people know Melissa, they know she's a chemist. And then her having a podcast about chemistry, she's like, oh, makes sense.
Melissa:Yeah. But they just assume that it's really complicated.
Jam:Right.
Melissa:They're like, oh, that's for other chemists. I'm like, no.
Jam:No. I mean, it it can be, but that's not the whole point. Yeah. Yeah. So one of the ones that I regularly say The people that I feel like kinda gets a little bit of a hook, they're like, oh, okay, is and I think it's the one ones you prior said too, which is, why do onions make you cry when you cut them?
Melissa:Yes.
Jam:That one's a big one where people are like, as soon as you say, yeah. We do episodes like, why do onions make you cry when you cut them?
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:People are like, Oh, I do wonder that. And you just have to realize, like, oh, okay. You guys are trying to approach questions like that that everyone might be interested in, even if they don't have a chemistry background at all. And so those are good. I think our coffee ones are probably pretty good because think whatever has an entry point, something really relevant to your life
Melissa:Yeah. That's true.
Jam:Is gonna help you be interested in it, and get in the Into the chemistry of it because you care about coffee if you're a coffee drinker. If you Yeah. Cook a lot, you've definitely chopped a bunch of onions and and regretted the Yes. Feelings in your
Melissa:eyes. So
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:I did ask I posted this came in on our Instagram, and I posted it and asked what other people thought. And somebody recommended The baking soda versus baking powder, but I think that could be hard because you have to think about a proton, which is confusing. Mhmm. But then also someone asked or someone mentioned the plastic series, and I think that is a good one. And the cast iron slash Teflon series, also a really good one.
Jam:Definitely.
Melissa:So those are probably some of my topics is the onions, coffee. Just Scrolling through on whatever seems fun to you, but Yeah. I tried to think of which ones the chemistry was pretty easy. Another one is the Y Go Go's walk on walls. That's probably
Jam:Oh, yeah. Yeah. And the the series about stickiness and intermolecular forces that's like, the episodes kind of around there Yeah. Were all interesting, but the geckos was probably The most accessible of those. Yeah.
Melissa:Oh, and antioxidants. That was another one.
Jam:Yes. Yes.
Melissa:Are they even good for you? Yeah.
Jam:And before we did this coffee specific ones, we did the caffeine one.
Melissa:Oh, people loved that one.
Jam:And that one's a really popular one because Even if you're not a coffee person, you may have some other form of caffeine or just be curious about it. So
Melissa:And my husband asked what our most listened to episode ever was, and I don't know the answer to that. So let me see if I can look it up.
Jam:Do you
Melissa:have a guess? What do you think?
Jam:I think, the one about Adderall Is it top 1?
Melissa:Oh, yeah.
Jam:And then I think why do people hate organic chemistry is, like, 2nd or 3rd. And
Melissa:That's funny.
Jam:I think our coffee ones and the coffee ones are kinda up there, but Amberware.
Melissa:Okay. Well, I'm sorting which ones have been most listened to. Well, the first one is the most listened to. It has 12,000. How to soak get things clean?
Melissa:And the next one is how do ADHD and Adderall Change our brains, and then why do people hate organic chemistry? You're so right. And then the chemistry of tears and then coffee.
Jam:Yeah. Years. Interesting. I'm surprised that one's up there.
Melissa:Yeah. Well, also, the sunlight, how can sunlight turn into electricity, which is also That and the organic chemistry one are both me just talking about my research. So I wonder if people just like hearing about
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:My like, hearing a Person talk about their own work.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:Yeah. Yeah. Cool. Good question, Neil.
Jam:Very good question. And if you listener out there have Listen to a bunch of our episodes, and you have an opinion about it less now? Yeah.
Melissa:It's the
Jam:one that you're like, oh, I think the best entry point for somebody to be this one. We'd love to hear that.
Melissa:You could go comment on our YouTube video, or you can Do just on our, on our Patreon if you subscribe or on Instagram.
Jam:Yep. We'd love to hear that. This last question's from Sam Wise. What is your favorite video game and or video game console?
Melissa:Okay. Well, I I wanted to hear your answer.
Jam:What a funny question to be to ask both of us specifically. I know.
Melissa:That's why I wanted to hear your answer, but I actually Do you really like a genre of games called cozy games? Who's surprised? I also like cozy mysteries.
Jam:Also, I didn't even realize that was, like, an actual, Like, game genre now.
Melissa:Yes. Our friend Chelsea, you know, she loves that. She loves Stardew Valley, which that one's my favorite. I'll tell a story about it in a minute. But then I said, did you know there's a whole genre?
Melissa:And she said, who do you think I am? Of course, I knew about that genre. So
Jam:That's funny.
Melissa:I like what they call Cozy games. So, Stardew Valley is the quintessential one where it's, like, peaceful, and you're just making your farm, and everything's Cute. That's really important to me. And then I got into Minecraft to play with my husband and his siblings, and that was fun because I could just make house looked the way I wanted it. Uh-huh.
Melissa:And I found these really pretty, underwater or an underground caves that have, like It's called the lush cave. They have the all these, like, cute pink flowers and plants, and I'm like, yeah. This is where I wanna live.
Jam:Uh-huh.
Melissa:So I do like those games for that. But I I also wanna say that my husband made our cake toppers.
Jam:Oh, yep.
Melissa:He did those are they Perler beads where you can iron things And they stick together?
Jam:They're what they're called, but yes.
Melissa:He used those to make us little versions of our characters in Stardew Valley only getting married.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:So that was cute.
Jam:Pretty cute.
Melissa:So that's my that's my video game response. But I really wanted to hear jams because When was the last time you played a video game? I don't think you even own a gaming console, which that's how I was before Yeah. I got married, but Mason owns so many that now I have to like video games I want him to like me.
Jam:I I don't know the last few day you might have played. But some background is I used to like, My brothers and I have 2 brothers, and so we grew up playing audio video games.
Melissa:Mhmm.
Jam:And then in college, I still played for a bit as well. And then I remember my sophomore year of college. They I got a lot busier. I wanna say around that that same year, a new console came out. And, of course, I'm a poor college student.
Jam:And so it's not like the console you have in is immediately outdated. People were moving on, and I got stuck in the past. Yeah. I've never been like a a computer a PC gamer before, and so Everything I played was, like, growing up was, like, Xbox or, you know, whatever whichever Nintendo was current. We had almost all of those.
Jam:And then, the last console I owned that was, like, relevant was the Xbox 360. So that's, like
Melissa:Okay.
Jam:Several ago. I don't know how many now. And so ever since, like, 2012, I have not been a gamer. That's over 10 years ago.
Melissa:So I just became a gamer. I don't even know if I'm a gamer, but, like Yeah. In 2020, basically, when the 1st game that I played was Stardew Valley because my husband and couldn't go on dates. Yeah. And so we because there's COVID, because we were in isolation.
Melissa:So we would meet in in the game. That was, like, how we went on dates remotely.
Jam:That's pretty cool.
Melissa:That's how he tricked me into playing game. Yeah. Because before, I was like, what a waste of time.
Jam:I will say that just so I can actually give an answer instead of just being a. The the some games that I have loved I mean, if growing up, if you were nineties if you're a kid where most of your childhood was in the nineties, then You did a lot of, like, Mario and that kind of stuff.
Melissa:I mostly just watched my brother play games while I did chemistry homework.
Jam:Okay. Yeah. There you go. There's the you really switched strolls in all ways. The fact that you've had a renaissance of video games in in, like, your Early thirties is pretty awesome.
Jam:But so I played a lot of, Mario and Zelda. Love those games. And I even I think I think we actually we've talked about this on the podcast once. Earl in our early days, I was able to figure out a a way to get an emulator Yes. To play some of those old games again.
Melissa:That was fun. I got to play Pokemon.
Jam:Yes. And I played I played through, Mario 64 on an emulator. And
Melissa:So that was probably the last game you played.
Jam:Yeah. Probably, like, the last real video game I played.
Melissa:But Yeah.
Jam:So I did a lot as a kid, and then I think the games that were huge for me in college in my last my last video game era was, a lot of Halo.
Melissa:Oh, yeah. The Halo is when I watched my brother play while I did homework.
Jam:And as a kid, also, we played, this is in the cozy game category. Animal Crossing The people who created it, like, liked Animal Crossing also.
Melissa:Somebody told me I should play Animal Crossing.
Jam:So I played that as the one of the earlier versions of that game, and then I played, think in high school, they came with a new one. I played that one. But in college, my last era of video games was, Halo I wanna say Halo Reach was the one that was out then. That was you know, you couldn't go anywhere in in college up find people playing that in the dorms or whatever.
Melissa:And then I don't have that experience.
Jam:And then, Skyrim came out.
Melissa:Oh, I've heard of that one.
Jam:Yeah. And that one with my my But the last game I got obsessed with, so that tells you something. There's some people who play that, of course, but, there's been so many other big games that have happened Since then for the you know, many years since then. And so I got left behind.
Melissa:Yeah. But
Jam:I'm okay now. I'm too busy, so there's no way I could fit them in if I even wanted to. Even if I had the money, I couldn't do it.
Melissa:Yeah. That's you got left behind, and I got sucked into someone else's. I'm like, why do we need A PlayStation 5 and a Nintendo Switch, and you can play games on your computer, and I could play games on my laptop. Like, that seems excessive. But, You know?
Melissa:I get it now. I do. It's
Jam:And what's cool is that Mason's siblings play together, which is maybe you said it earlier.
Melissa:What's fun. It's not playing By yourself? I don't think it's usually fun to play by myself. I'd rather just read or do anything else. But playing with other people is what makes video games fun, I think.
Melissa:Yeah. So
Jam:Yeah. 100%.
Melissa:Yeah. That that's, I think, how they tricked me into it is it was like a community event. It's like a way to connect with people. Yep. So that was a good question.
Melissa:Oh, oh, I did wanna share a little bit of nostalgia is that I think the 1st gaming system we ever had was a Sega Genesis.
Jam:Oh, nice.
Melissa:Which did you have one of those?
Jam:I did not, but a friend of mine did, and I was at his house a lot. So I played it plenty.
Melissa:When I think of video games, I think of that, like, Sega. Yeah. Make that sound. Yeah. So, yeah, that was my nostalgia.
Melissa:That's my most nostalgic video game console because I don't really have a favorite. Just play Stardew Valley. Yeah. You know? Yeah.
Jam:Sweet. Hey.
Melissa:Well, I think that's all the questions. Those were really good ones. Thanks, Jam, for reading those, and thanks our listeners for sending those in.
Jam:Yes. Thank you all. We love your questions. They're the best. Yeah.
Jam:We love the chemistry specific ones and the ones that we're a little bit outside of that, like the new games. Always very fun, so thank you all for attending those.
Melissa:Yeah. It feels like a chance that we get to talk about our personalities a little bit
Jam:coming out. Yes. Definitely. Which, you know, we find rats for that in the regular episodes, but we have a little more breathing room on these. So that's fun.
Jam:So, yeah, thank you for sending your questions and ideas, Melissa. And I love hearing this from you guys. We have a lot of ideas of our own, but y'all's questions, y'all's topics, y'all's Episode ideas was from the best, so you can reach out to us on our website at kimforyourlife.com. That's kim, f o r, your life.com to share your thoughts and ideas. If If you'd like to help us keep our show going and contribute to cover the cost of making it, go to patreon.com/kem for your life or Have a link in our show notes or in the description to join our super cool community of patrons and get exclusive stuff.
Jam:If you're not able to do that, you can still help us by subscribing in your favorite podcast app and reading and writing a review on Apple Podcasts. That also helps us to share commission with even more people. One quick thing about the review deal. We say this every episode, of course. And so if you're a frequent listener, it's like you probably get used to the rhythm of that.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:We got a review this past week, which we don't actually check these Actively very often, we get an email sometimes if we get a new one, and then it's in our inbox, and we have to read it. Usually, they are encouraging And really nice, and we love reading them. Or they might have a bit of, like, helpful feedback that's that means well. This this week, we got one that says, I could not make it past the first 10 minutes of idiotic babble An egocentric millennial whining. What a shame.
Jam:I had higher hopes. The topics looked compelling. 1st, let me say, you you if you're listening to this, you're probably not one of these people who feels this way because you listen to this whole episode.
Melissa:To all of our millennial Ego centric babble.
Jam:Yeah. Exactly. Then these q and r's especially. It's like, we were you know, we hang out. We said whatever.
Jam:If you're someone like that, like, we might just not be the podcast for you. One thing I wanna say, though, is, like, this is the problem with the Internet culture right now. This person's just 1 person, and it's actually a trend. So it's not their fault only. But the idea of, like, being very impersonal and not caring about Like, thankfully, we are pretty unfazed Yeah.
Jam:By this. I like to take the opportunity to, like, make this person be an example for what we should all not be. But I don't really care we don't really care what they think because they're just not our kind of listener. This kind of person wants Something else, and that's okay.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:What I think is really odd is the go put a 1 star review and say I couldn't make it past the 1st 10 minutes. It's like just, like, Very impersonal, not not kind to other humans, and, we will not miss this person now listening to our podcast. They can go somewhere else listen to something else. The people who listen to our podcast are really involved in our community that we hear from a lot, send us questions, Send us corrections, which we do need those.
Melissa:Love those. Yeah. And we love constructive feedback whenever we've gotten feedback about maybe somebody said, oh, Jam Interrupts a little too often or or enunciate more or things like that. We'll take the constructive feedback that we know how to change For sure.
Jam:And and we want people to like the podcast, but it's of course, we can't make it be something completely different either. And so this is what we know how to make. And if you like it, we're really glad you're here, and, we hope this helps you like chemistry more. That's, like, been Melissa's vision from the beginning. Yeah.
Jam:But also, if this is not your cup of tea, then not your cup of tea. Move on. You don't have to you know, we're just a little indie podcast, so I feel like I could see other podcasters receiving a review like this, and it just taken all the wind out of their sales. You know? And it's just mean spirited.
Melissa:Yeah. I think it that's the thing is, like, I've heard other podcasters have a really hard time with getting a lot of negative reviews, and it kind of, like, Making them question their value or their worth, and, like, even some of them having, like, emotional breakdowns because it's so hard. Yeah. I think we really believe in what we're doing, and we have so many nice people that we just love hearing from. Yep.
Melissa:So for us, this isn't as big of a deal, but we don't want
Jam:And we have each other too, which helps. I think if either of us are doing some sort of solo endeavor, any feedback is solely squarely on you Yeah. Is it a single person? At least we can kinda share the the load a bit. Like, oh, okay.
Jam:We could do that differently or whatever. Or in this case, it's like, we can laugh about it together. Yeah. And with you guys, which is pretty funny.
Melissa:It did it did make me laugh. I'll say that. Yeah. But I also wanna take a chance to shout out some of the people who have left us really nice pot, Podcast reviews recently. So 1 person said, I'm a chemist to be binging your podcast from, from Iran, binging your podcast from of Tehran.
Melissa:And I thought that was really cool.
Jam:Yes.
Melissa:And there's another one who said, this has been extremely informational, exciting podcast to listen to as my partner is a chemist, And I didn't usually know or pretend to care about what she was talking about, but now I'm constantly fascinated. So that's really exciting. Yeah. Someone else said, and this is kind of on theme. If you're a future podcast listener, after enjoying the show, you must come and give 5 stars.
Melissa:Give them a reward for their hard work, which You don't have to, but it really helps us. Yeah. And then, yeah, just people say about how chemistry, you know, is it's making chemistry fun and how informative it is. And so there's so many people that have left us good reviews. We don't only wanna give attention to the person who who gave a negative one.
Melissa:Yeah. We just wanna address that, like, Unkind nature.
Jam:Yes. And also we thought it's a good reminder because we say this every week, every episode. But if you're someone who's listened for a while and you like the it really does help us a lot for you to write a review on Apple Podcasts. 1, it helps other people looking for podcasts just Discover us. And one of the things that we've found because we don't do much, you know, we just do a lot of word-of-mouth stuff.
Jam:People find our podcast because they just go look Means the world to us, and, we'd love to have your review. So if you've listened for a while and haven't taken the chance to do that, we just wanna encourage you to do that. It helps us a ton, and it takes to, you know, only 30 seconds or so. And so please do that if you've been waiting to, and just know how much that means to us. We love Hearing those reviews, and even if you don't have time to type something, if you just go put whatever stars you think is appropriate, it helps us, and it it adds more of an accurate score to our, our ratings.
Jam:What you finalize is some people who high, high praise go there, and people who are the most annoyed, Grouchy, grumpy, only have the wrong side of their bed to wake up on kind of folks, and the that kind of makes Thanks for any independent creators. Like, their rating scores aren't really that accurate because it's the happiest people and the angriest people. Yeah. You know? So anyway for sure.
Jam:Let this be a reminder to you, and and thank you guys who've already done that. We've appreciated y'all's feedback and and reviews and encouragement. And now I'm I'll end my section that I added a lot on.
Melissa:I'll throw
Jam:it to you.
Melissa:This episode of chemistry for your life was created by Melissa Collini and Jam Robinson. Jam Robinson is our producer, and this episode was made possible by our financial supporters on Patreon. It means so much to us that you wanna to help make chemistry accessible to even more people. And those supporters are Avishai B, Brie M, Brian K, Chris and Claire s, Chelsea b, Derek l, Emerson w, Hunter r, Jacob t, Christina g, Lynn s, Melissa p, Nicole c, Steven b, Shadow, Suzanne s, Timothy p, Venus r. Thanks again for everything you all do to make
