Science

Temperature can affect the amount of electricity produced by a wind generator or wind turbine in several ways. Depending on the temperature, efficiency of the turbine can either be decreased on...

Infrared thermometers (temperature laser guns) give you a means to take the temperature of objects that are too difficult or dangerous to access otherwise, by using an infrared beam to collect the...

Humidity, a measure of water vapor in the air, is one of the variables measured in basic meteorology. There are actually several different kinds of humidity, but what most people mean when they...

Want to convert a temperature from Celsius to Fahrenheit? This 'how to' will show you how - it will give you a degree in converting degrees! Only simple math skills required for this calculation.

While the United States uses the Fahrenheit scale to measure temperatures, most of the world uses the metric measurement, Celsius. The two scales represent the same temperature in widely different...

Welding cast iron using a tungsten inert gas (TIG) welder is possible, but will challenge even the most seasoned welder. Cast iron contains a lot of carbon; anywhere from 3 percent to as much as 8...

In the simplest terms, a thermometer is used in weather forecasting by measuring temperature. The name is made up of the two words: "thermo" meaning heat and "meter" meaning to measure....

Specific gravity is a unitless measure of density, defined as the ratio of the density of a substance to the density of water at some specified pressure and density. In tables, the temperature and...

While temperature has little direct effect on wooden beams, it does have a great effect on the moisture both outside and within the beams. By increasing and decreasing the levels of moisture in...

A fuse is an electrical component used in an electrical circuit for safety reasons. A fuse opens the circuit, or prevents the flow of electrical current, when conditions exist that will cause the...

Something is considered magnetic when it attracts or repels an item. Every magnet has two sides, known as poles. When similar poles are near each other, the magnets are repelled; when opposite...

Modern commercial airliners fly at altitudes which, without protection, would quickly become dangerous for anyone flying inside. To counter the low air pressure and cold temperatures, aircraft are...

Pyrex brand cookware has been around since 1915. It was originally owned and manufactured by Corning Glass, but they sold it in 1998 to World Kitchen. Corning Glass used mainly borosilicate glass...

Copper is the most widely used electrical conductor because it is inexpensive and second only to silver in electrical conduction. Although low, copper does provide some resistance to current that...

A sensor is a device that measures a particular characteristic of an object or system. Some sensors are purely mechanical, but most sensors are electronic, returning a voltage signal that can be...

The rolling fog that results from the reaction of dry ice and water is one of the most familiar and impressive special effects that you can produce without extensive preparation or special...

A thermistor is a semiconductor device with an electrical resistance proportional to temperature. The name is formed from a combination of the words "resistor" and "thermal." Thermistors come in...

The conversion of temperature from Fahrenheit to Celsius is a very easy equation. A calculator will make it easier but is optional. There are also many online conversion calculators as well to...

There are two types of mercury thermometers. The first type of thermometer either measures the temperature, indoors or out. Used in medicine, the second type of thermometer measures body temperature.

Thermocouples are temperature sensors that are made from two different metals. A voltage is generated when the metals are brought together to form a junction and there are temperature differences...

Thermocouples are temperature sensors formed from two dissimilar metals. When the metals are joined together in a junction and are held at different temperatures, a voltage is generated. These...

A thermocouple is an electronic circuit that is used to measure temperature. A thermocouple uses two different metals to form a junction, which produces an electrical potential that can be...

Cesium (Cs) is a chemical element and has the atomic number 55. It's highly reactive with water and is one of the few metals that are liquid at or near room temperature.

The Galileo thermometer is both a scientific tool and a decorative display of physical forces. Unlike standard thermometers, which are constructed for practical purposes of temperature...

Salt is often used in ice cream makers to make the water surrounding the inside container cold enough to freeze the cream. In fact, within half an hour or so, the super cold water can freeze...

For decades, optical sensors have been finding their way into an increasing number of applications. The development of semiconductors in the 1940s and '50s led to lower-cost, compact and efficient...

Sodium metasilicate, Na₂SiO₃, can be synthesized with various degrees of hydration. This very alkaline substance is formed by combining and melting sodium carbonate with silicon...

Thermocouples are temperature sensors that are made from two metal alloys. When the two metals are brought together to form a junction, a voltage is generated when there are temperature...

The reaction that produces hydrogen gas was discovered by Robert Boyle in 1671. French chemist Antoine Lavoisier derived the name hydrogen from the Greek words for "water former." The atmosphere...

Refractometers have been used since 1874 to determine the concentration of solutions and to identify unknown substances by the way light refracts through them. There are refractometers that are...

Most mushrooms today are grown indoors, allowing them to be grown year round. They grow rather fast (within 6 to 8 weeks) and need to be placed in a cool, damp place where the humidity can be...

When we wonder why air expands with heat, it's like asking why volume is a function of temperature. The answer is because heat in a gas is the random kinetic energy of the molecules. Pressure is...

BTU stands for "British Thermal Unit." It is a measurement of heat, and each individual unit represents the amount of heat required to raise 1 lb. of water 1 degree F. Each BTU is equivalent to...

Two standard experiments are used to demonstrate Newton's law of cooling. One is to heat a thermometer, and then note the rate at which the temperature drops as it cools. Another is to heat a...

Silicone is a form of specialty polymer that can be manufactured in more than 2,000 forms. These forms are broken into liquids, solids and gases. Silicone is resistant to moisture, chemicals, UV...

A psychrometer, sometimes called a "wet bulb/dry bulb thermometer," is just that. It has two thermometers, one red and one blue. They may read in the Celsius scale or in degrees Fahrenheit. One...

A sling psychrometer is an instrument that measures the relative humidity and dew point in an area. A sling psychrometer has two thermometers: a wet bulb and a dry bulb. The wet bulb has a cotton...

Rhenium, discovered in Germany in 1925, is a transitional metal, and one of the rarest naturally occurring elements in the world. It is a very dense metal, with a higher melting point than every...

Making a homemade liquid thermometer is fun and very easy. This will teach you and your kids about how mercury works in a store-bought thermometer, and will be a fun home science project. This...

Specific gravity is a unit-less measure, defined as the ratio of the density of an object divided by the density of water at a specific temperature. sually the temperature used is 4°C or...

Most industrial and scientific thermometers can be calibrated to make them even more accurate. It is not difficult to calibrate a dial thermometer, but it is important that you do it correctly.

Heat transfer is the transition of thermal energy from a hotter object to a cooler object. Heat is how we experience on a macro level the vibrational motion of molecules' thermal energy. The...

Somehow a myth arose that cold water boils faster than hot water. It is true that colder water warms faster than hot water, but as it becomes hotter, the rate of warming slows down. This is...

Gas pressure is the result of the collisions of gas molecules with a surface. In the case of a closed container, that surface is the walls of the container. A fundamental assumption of the...

Liquid oxygen, also known as LOX, is created from oxygen atoms that have been forced to assume a liquid state due to compression and manipulations of temperature. Naturally, oxygen prefers to be a...

The source of all solar energy on Earth comes from Sol (the sun), the star at the center of the solar system. The core temperature of the sun is approximately 27,000,000 degrees Fahrenheit. This...

Ice, and by association the water that is around ice, isn't as static or as simplistic as it may first appear. When the temperature of water is at the freezing point--0 degrees Celsius for the...

Ice melts a number of ways, but it's not always intuitive which method is best. We all know that adding salt to ice seems to make it melt; we see it at work in the winter on the roads after a...

Most of the early work in fluid dynamics was done with low-speed flows, in which density could be assumed to be constant. At the dawn of the jet age, new phenomenon, like shock waves, began to...

Temperature is a key factor affecting the rate of chemical reactions. In general, as temperature increases, so does the reaction rate. This is the reason why food is stored in the refrigerator:...