Can You Make a Plasma Ball of Water?

Make a plasma ball with an outside coating of water.

Plasma balls with their colorful plasma beams shooting out towards a surrounding sphere are common sights in science classrooms. Because of the way these devices work, they cannot be made out of water.

Mechanics

Plasma balls work on the scientific principal that similarly charged particles repel each other. The outer sphere is "grounded," which means a charged particle that touches the sphere has a path to follow. The central electrode emits these charged particles, which repel from each other into the gas surrounding the electrode and seek the grounded sphere.

Light Show

The streams that you see inside a plasma ball are streams of plasma. Plasma is not a liquid, solid or a gas. It is a fourth state of matter. The plasma as you see it in a plasma ball is not the "natural" color of plasma: the jumping electrons in the plasma stream interact with the gas suspended inside the plasma ball's sphere to turn it into bluish colors. Examples of the gases used inside plasma balls include helium and neon.

Plasma Balls and Water

The plasma beams you see in the plasma ball are traveling through a medium of gas sealed in the sphere. Consequently, if this area were filled with water, the plasma ball would not work.

References

• University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: Physics Van - Plasma Ball
• University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: Physics Van - Plasma Ball Gases