Make a Gallium Beating Heart

In this video we make a blob of gallium "beat" like some weird alien heart attack.

To do it, add 2g of gallium to a 10mL solution of 6M sulfuric acid and warm it up on a hot plate to 50 Celsius. It'll pull together to form a sphere of gallium. Now carefully touch the gallium with an Iron nail or iron wire. What's happening is first the gallium is reacting the sulfuric to form gallium sulfate that sticks to the surface and increases the surface tension to the point that it pulls itself together into a sphere. Then when an iron nail touches it the iron transfers electrons to the gallium (while being oxidized itself and thus dissolving slightly) and this causes the gallium sulfate to reduce back to gallium. The surface tension drops and the gallium drops away, If the iron is held just right, the gallium will drop away from the iron. The gallium then react with the sulfuric acid again and create gallium sulfate and pull itself back into a sphere. The cycle will repeat.

If you want some gallium yourself, you can order it from http://galliumsource.com
Be sure to use the coupon code "nurdrage" to get a 5% discount on all products.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Science
• Experiments
• chemistry
• electrochemistry
• redox

[dominic14061995]

Can we actually reuse the gallium after this experiment? it would be a waste to just throw it away...

[NurdRage]

@dominic14061995 yup, just dump the solution with the gallium into cold water. the gallium should quickly freeze up and you can then retrieve it, dry it, and store it for later reuse.

[NurdRage]

@TheHomeGamer1 much less so than ammonium dichromate, and only if inhaled in mist form. If you're inhaling sulfuric acid mists you've got a much bigger problem than carcinogenicity. dilute liquid sulfuric acid has not been identified as carcinogenic as far i know. Also, you're still using sulfuric acid even if you use the ammonium dichromate approach.

If you're honestly that worried about sulfuric acid then don't do the experiment.

[KronicKillaz]

@Th3Rav3N94 You must honestly be a moron. He said it in the video AND there is a link in the description.

[Th3Rav3N94]

where can i get the gallium ? please help me ..

[comrade110397]

Replace that gallium with Caesium for a cooler effect lol.

[backhair51]

@aei05h1 I did!!!!!!!!!!! There are tons of sites so I just wanted to see if anyone could recommend anything in particular.

[aei05h1]

@backhair51 GOOGLE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[backhair51]

I'm really fascinated by all of this but a lot of it goes over my head because I've never studied chemistry before. Can anyone recommend some sites that teach basic chemistry so that I can appreciate the finer details of these experiments?

[HunterMitchell3]

@NurdRage, Not to be a troll, but you can melt with water at 95 degrees. Just wanted to give you a tip, just if you didn't know!

[Tyranidwarriorman1]

acid... NOW PUT UR HAND IN THERE!

[ExplosiveElephants]

But...CAN IT BLEND?

[settah17]

If you where to return the heat of the beaker to room temperature would the gallium stay in a sphere?