Liquid Nitrogen and the Tea Kettle Mystery

Everyone knows that liquid nitrogen is cold and everyone knows that tea kettles whistle when they're hot, so what's going on here??

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• liquid nitrogen
• liquid nitrogen experiment
• liquid nitrogen demo
• liquid nitrogen demonstration
• tea
• kettle
• demonstration
• show
• boil
• hot
• freeze
• cold
• frost
• tongue
• leidenfrost effect
• frostbite theater
• science
• experiment
• jefferson lab
• jlab
• education
• Temperature

[CAZZERNERY]

From the thermometer where it says nitrogen and helium boils, is it the smaller the atom, the lower the temperature it needs to boil?

[JeffersonLab]

@CAZZERNERY Not completely. If it were, then you would expect hydrogen to have a lower boiling point than helium, but it doesn't. The mass of the atom/molecule is important, but so are the forces between individual atoms/molecules. The more they 'stick' to each other, the more difficult it is to make them change to a gas.

[TheAdeler1]

so when it does freeze you it could kill you?

[JeffersonLab]

@TheAdeler1 It depends on how much of you gets frozen.

[TheAdeler1]

would it poison you?

[JeffersonLab]

@TheAdeler1 No, nitrogen isn't poisonous. It'll freeze you, but not poison you.

[JeffersonLab]

@Blackjesus209 Exactly, exactly? Our latitude and longitude are: 37.097189, -76.487010. Just copy and paste that into Google Maps and there we are!

[JeffersonLab]

@Astanize Yep. When you have nearly instant access to a 9,000 gallon storage tank, you get into that mindset.

[zemas1712]

@TheAdeler1 over 70% of the air you breathe is nitrogen... it would be very problematic if it was poisonous

[AllThePupil]

Mr. Freeze favorite element

[JeffersonLab]

@TheAdeler1 If you drank enough, yes.

[TheAdeler1]

Would it freeze your insides if you drank it