Surfactants are compounds that lower the surface tension (or interfacial tension) between two liquids or between a liquid and a solid. [3]. [1] Other factors that affect the growth rate or total number of carbon dioxide bubbles also changed the geyser's height, such as temperature and the original surface tension of the soda. 4 Answers. Already have an account? Coffey, T. Favorite Answer. Their explanation is this process called nucleation. A Mentos dropped into a bottle of soda acts as a surfactant, meaning it reduces the surface tension of the soda. Many people speculated that the geyser was the result of an acid base reaction, given the low pH of soda. can u make a list of things that makes coke explode besides mentos? Dan Hooper: What happened at the big bang? A Mentos candy can help with this. A tube the width of the Mentos. Coffey and company discovered that the ingredients in the Mentos and Diet Coke and, more importantly, the structure of the Mentos, allow carbon dioxide bubbles to form extremely rapidly. Measurements showed that the surface tension in water containing the sweetener aspartame is lower than in sugary water, explaining why Diet Coke creates more dramatic fountains than sugary Coke. And if you add a big enough surfactant, you get a geyser. This pressure forces the soda to explode out the top of the bottle. Colas have an acid pH, and the mentos have a base pH. Log in here. Log in. Additionally, the stomach has a couple ways of expelling excess gases. The participant got it right for $8,000, saying: “I saw it on TV and I bought Mentos and a 2-liter bottle of Diet Coke . Guys today we will see that what will happen if we put mentos in coke!! Low surface tension also helps bubbles grow quickly. The rough, dimply surfaces of Mentos encourage bubble growth because they efficiently disrupt the polar attractions between water molecules, creating bubble growth sites. [2]. Surfactants may act as detergents, wetting agents, emulsifiers, foaming agents, and dispersants. 1 decade ago. You can buy a device to help you do this, but an easy solution is to roll a piece of paper or thin cardboard into a tube. This is essentially speeding up the process that makes sodas fizzy. Though the manuscript is behind a paywall, a presentation that Dr. Coffey made about the experience is available on the schools website. One roll of Mentos candies. What does Mentos have in them that makes soda explode? One way to put a unique spin on this experiment is to disguise the soda bottle as a volcano. But there have been no rigorous scientific studies of the reaction until now. Yes, it can be dangerous to drink that! Relevance. They are covered in bumpy craters, which increases the total surface area. Diet Coke and Mentos: What is really behind this physical reaction?. “If you drop a pack of Mentos into a bottle of Diet Coke, you get this huge fountain of spray and Diet Coke foam coming out,” says Tonya Coffey, a physicist at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. Anonymous. This can be a plastic cutting board, a piece of … • Also, none of the ingredients in Mentos are basic: sugar, glucose syrup, hydrogenated coconut oil, gelatin, dextrin, natural flavor, corn starch, gum arabic. Soda geysters, which can reach as high as ten meters, were a popular subject for viral videos in the early 2000's, but the science behind the spectacle remained a mystery until 2008. In addition, the aspartame in a diet soda enhances the gum arabic’s job. When mint or fruit Mentos are dropped into a fresh bottle of Diet Coke, a jet of Coke whooshes out of the bottle's mouth and can reach a height of 10 metres. Mentos are also fairly dense and sink rapidly, quickly creating bubbles that seed further bubbles as they rise. Place a finger or index card over the end of the tube to hold the candy in place and drop an entire roll inside. Diet Coke and Mentos eruption A Diet Coke and Mentos eruption (also known as a soda geyser) is a reaction between the carbonated beverage Diet Coke and Mentos mints that causes the beverage to spray out of its container. Sign up to read our regular email newsletters, Video: The explosive reaction produced by adding Mentos to Diet Coke has at last been explained, Scanning electron microscope images show the roughness of mint Mentos (top and bottom left) and fruit Mentos (top and bottom right), the scale bars representing lengths from 20 to 200 micrometres, (Image: T Coffey/Dewel Microscopy Facility/AAPT). The Diet Coke and Mentos experiment may be one of the most popular experiments, but of the people who perform this experiment not that many actually understand the chemistry concepts behind it. Mentos candies are not as smooth as they appear to the naked eye. “And if you have rough candy with a high ratio of surface area to volume, then there’s more places for the bubbles to go.”. The project was eventually published in the American Journal of Physics. Coke/Mentos reaction using a pH meter with a 2 point calibration. There is an urban legend that eating mentos while drinking soda could cause a person's stomach to burst. All the reactions took place in a bottle angled at 10° off vertical and the fountain trajectories were recorded on video. Buy a 2 litter bottle of Diet Coke and a roll of Mentos. The engineer explains that the yellow nose cap is full of mentos, while the body is full of pressurized diet coke. Perseverance Mars landing: Will NASA find life? Over 1 million people now use Prezi Video to share content with their audiences The results showed that Diet Coke created the most spectacular explosions with either fruit or mint Mentos, the fountains travelling a horizontal distance of up to 7 metres. Just drop a few Mentos into a bottle of Diet Coke and you’ll see a violent 16 foot fountain of Coke explode out of the bottle. They also compared reactions using other fizzy liquids such as caffeine-free and sugary colas, as well as soda water and tonic water. This leads to the classic Mentos and Diet Coke eruption. The two biggest factors affecting the geyser are the roughness of the candy used and the rate at which it sinks to the bottom of the soda bottle. Adam and Jamie explore the science behind the fabled Diet Coke and Mentos phenomenon. The chemical reactions involved in dropping mentos candies into a bottle of diet coke make quite the spectacle! Steve Spangler's televised demonstration o… In fact, it’s not really a reaction at all – or at least it’s a physical reaction rather than a chemical one. There is an urban legend that eating mentos while drinking soda could cause a person's stomach to burst. Find a big open area to launch your Mentos Coke Rocket. Chuck Norris. Mixing mentos and soda makes a great science demonstration for students studying gases, thermodynamics, fluid dynamics, surface science, and the physics of explosions among other chemistry and physics concepts. So, if you open a bottle of soda gently, you get a pleasant beverage. Poprocks might? However, your stomach is not enough of a seal to keep this sudden pressure change contained inside. Make sure you drop in all the Mentos candies at once. Mint candies are more basic, increasing the acid-base reaction, Mint candies are more acidic, increasing the acid-base reaction, Fruit candies have a more rough coating, decreasing nucleation sites, Fruit candies have a smoother coating, decreasing nucleation sites, http://www.appstate.edu/~coffeyts/DietCokeandMentos.pdf, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mb6neBVtvsE, https://brilliant.org/wiki/why-do-mentos-explode-in-coke/. The speed at which the Mentos falls through the Diet Coke can affect how large the eruption is. so I’m going to go with Mentos. The scientific guide to a better Christmas dinner, Ten conservation success stories when species came back from the brink. If you crush the Mentos, so it doesn’t sink much at all, you won’t get nearly the dramatic reaction. Swigging some Coke and swallowing some Mentos will essentially cause a lot of the carbon dioxide trapped in the soda in your stomach to suddenly bubble and try to escape. But caffeine-free Diet Coke did just as well, suggesting that caffeine does not accelerate the reaction, at least at the normal levels in the drink. To create bubbles, the carbon dioxide needs to interact with itself, which means that the carbon dioxide's bonds with water in the Diet Coke must be broken. You can do the same with baking soda and vinegar. Drop a few Mentos into a two-liter bottle of soda, and a geyser of foam erupts rapidly, sometimes reaching heights of 15 feet or more. That’s my final answer.” The contestant ended up doing really well, going all the way to the $250,000 question, but he walked away with $125,000. However, most of the carbonation is released from the soda as it is being drunk, so the pressure is lower and carbon dioxide is less likely to nucleate. (2008). When mint or fruit Mentos are dropped into a fresh bottle of Diet Coke, a jet of Coke whooshes out of the bottle’s mouth and can reach a height … . But the amazing eruption that takes place when Mentos are dropped into Diet Coke or other brands of diet soda pop is not a chemical reaction at all ! Jan. 20, 2021. Sign up, Existing user? Sign up to read all wikis and quizzes in math, science, and engineering topics. There is. Instead, the vigour of the jets depends on various factors that affect the growth rate of carbon dioxide bubbles. Shake shake Shake Shake Shake it!! Avi Loeb: Is ‘Oumuamua extraterrestrial technology? What sodas react with Mentos? The force exerted by the soda stream can be harnessed to do work. caffeine, potassium benzoate, Aspartame, and CO2 gas contained in the Diet Coke, in combination with the Gelatin and gum Arabic ingredients of the Mentos, all contribute to the jet effect 0 0 1 The team also investigated the total mass lost in the fountain and the influence of the sweet’s surface roughness. When you look at Mentos candy, it’s hard to believe it can cause such a reaction in soda . Carbon dioxide is what makes the soda bubbly. . 0 0. Rough-surfaced mints without the surfactant did not create such large fountains. When mint or fruit Mentos are dropped into a fresh bottle of Diet Coke, a jet of Coke whooshes out of the bottle’s mouth and can reach a height of 10 metres. 0 0. A study in the US has identified the prime factors that drive the fizzy plumes from Coke bottles: the roughness of the sweet and how fast it plummets to the bottle’s base. It just won’t be nearly as awesome.) Related LeafTv Articles. “This was a good project for my students to study because there was still some mystery to it.”. [1], Tonya Coffey, a professor at Appalachian State University, used the experiment to give her undergraduate physics class a real-world research experience as one of their laboratory assignments. Carbonated drinks get their fizz from dissolved carbon dioxide, which is pumped into … Mentos candies have a lot of gum arabic, which is a type of chemical we call a “surfactant.” It tends to reduce the amount of surface tension in water. Theories abound as to why this happens, with some bloggers speculating that it is an acid-base reaction because Coke is acidic. Water molecules are polar and attracted to each other. Pour a little baking soda on a spoon. However, the practical applications of this reaction are limited by the sticky mess it makes. The carbon dioxide molecules attach to the surfaces of the Mentos like they did in the cup of soda. 1 decade ago. Designing the Volcano Find a base for your volcano. A rougher candy surface translates to more places for bubbles to grow, or more nucleation sites. Blog. Science Fair 2012. However, most of the carbonation is released from the soda as it is being drunk, so the pressure is lower and carbon dioxide is less likely to nucleate. Answer Save. As the Mentos candy sinks in the bottle, the candy causes the production of more and more carbon dioxide bubbles. I am not so much acquainted with this question... so I needed help from Wikipedia. The Red-Blue Blur. A Mentos mint causes a bottle of Diet Coke to fizz over because the irregular surface of the mint provides numerous nucleation sites for the carbonation in the Diet Coke. One of the most popular experiments of modern times is the Diet Coke and Mentos Geyser. This makes it even easier for the carbon dioxide to escape. MasterChuy. An index card (picture below) The Mentos And Coke Volcano Experiment You can use any soda but room temperature Diet Coke for some reason is the best performer. The explosion created when soda and Mentos are combined occurs because of nucleation, a process in which the carbon dioxide in the soda attempts to latch onto the outside of the Mentos, creating a huge amount of pressure. Theories abound as to why this happens, with some bloggers speculating that it is an acid-base reaction because Coke is acidic. The sugar in the Mentos reacts with the artificial sugar in the DIET coke and causes a violent chemical reaction that releases a lot of gas. Measurements of the pH of the Coke before and after the experiments showed that its acidity did not change, ruling out the idea that a simple acid-base reaction drives the fountains. Diet Coke & Mentos Eruption. It's the same chemistry, but a different magnitude. Made popular by Steve Spangler, this experiment is a lot of fun and sure to amaze your friends and family (assuming you do it outside rather than in the living room). The candies catalyze the release of gas from the beverage, which creates an eruption that pushes most of the liquid up and out of the bottle. The engineer explains that the yellow nose cap is full of mentos, while the body is full of pressurized diet coke. A Cheap Alternative to Mentos Can you believe there's more to say on the Diet Coke and Mentos story? If you shake the can first, you disrupt the solution and get a face full of soda. Additionally, the stomach has a couple ways of expelling excess gases. In the 1980s, Wint-O-Green Life Savers were used to create soda geysers. With a little extra effort, you can make this experiment artistically appealing as well as technically surprising. All the carbon dioxide in the soda – all that fizz – is squeezed into the liquid and looking for a way out. “It’s a great way to get students excited about science and learn something new.”, Journal reference: American Journal of Physics, DOI: 10.1119/1.2888546, Exclusive: Two variants have merged into heavily mutated coronavirus, Two coronavirus variants have merged – here's what you need to know, Rescue plan for nature: How to fix the biodiversity crisis, Insect brains will teach us how to make truly intelligent robots, Life found beneath Antarctic ice sheet 'shouldn't be there', How to find astronomy’s handiest reference point – the ecliptic, Oldest evidence of malted barley shows ancient Scandinavians made beer, First million-year-old DNA extracted from Siberian mammoth teeth, Some online food shoppers make healthier choices if they are ‘nudged’. The basic science of the Coke and Mentos reaction is fairly straightforward. Anything that breaks them apart allows for bubbles of carbon dioxide gas to form in the solution. Watch the full video for a more detailed explanation. It needs to be wide enough to use as loader for the Mentos. When you put the two together, they react. Lee Marek and "Marek's Kid Scientists" were the first to publicly demonstrate the experiment on the Late Show with David Letterman in 1999. Forgot password? When the pressure is released, the carbon dioxide is forced out of solution and makes little gas bubbles. A Diet Coke and Mentos eruption (also known as a soda geyser) is a reaction between the carbonated beverage Diet Coke and Mentos mints that causes the beverage to spray out of its container. After a lot of debate, scientists are now saying that the primary cause of Coke & Mentos geysers is a physical reaction, not a chemical reaction. Another factor is that the coatings of Mentos contain gum arabic, a surfactant that further reduces surface tension in the liquid. • But you can make a fun acid/base reaction, by adding baking soda to Diet Coke. “Water molecules like to be next to other water molecules, so basically anything that you drop into the soda that disrupts the network of water molecules can act as a growth site for bubbles,” Coffey told New Scientist. Dropping Mentos in Diet Coke has become a viral phenomenon, from popular YouTube videos to elementary school science classrooms. This rapid nucleation is what makes the Coke fizz over. A two-liter bottle of diet soda (diet soda makes for a much better reaction, but you can use regular soda if you like. A mint-flavored mentos makes a geyser 5 meters high and a fruit-flavored mentos makes a geyser 2 meters high when the two candies are put into identical bottles of soda under identical experimental conditions. To find out more, Coffey and a team of students tested the reactions between Diet Coke and fruit Mentos, mint Mentos, and various ingredients such as other mints, dish-washing detergent, table salt and sand. Among other things, the gum arabic that coats a Mentos candy lowers the surface tension of the soda, allowing carbon dioxide bubbles to rise and expand more easily. The candy coating traps the gas, forming bubbles and foam. 0 0. martin. What is the most reasonable hypothesis to explain the difference? New user? It was the same, 3.0. The startling reaction between Diet Coke and Mentos sweets, made famous in thousands of YouTube videos, finally has a scientific explanation. Experiments in a 2006 edition of the Discovery Channel programme Mythbusters suggested the chemicals responsible for the reaction are gum arabic and gelatine in the sweets, and caffeine, potassium benzoate and aspartame in the Coke. Diet Coke makes a better spectacle than regular Coca-Cola because both aspartame and benzonatate (a preservative used in artificially sweetened drinks) lower surface tension more than sugar does. Bottled sodas are kept under pressure so that more carbon dioxide can be forced into solution. 1 decade ago. Mentos are fairly dense objects and so tend to sink rapidly in the liquid. The Dangers of Mixing Coca Cola & Alcohol Drinks. However, none of the ingredients in mentos are basic, and the experiment works to some degree with any type of soda and any type of candy. “Middle-school teachers are getting their students out onto the baseball field next to their school and doing this reaction, and their students love it,” says Coffey. All those Mentos in a lot of soda make a lot of bubbles that rise … Crushed Mentos that fell more slowly created puny fountains that only travelled about 30 centimetres. Yet another factor that can affect the size of the Mentos / Coke geyser is the temperature of the soda itself. 4 years ago. One enterprising group made a mentos and diet coke-powered rocket.