In Which We Learn the Properties of Water

     Water is a basic need for every living thing (err mah gerd, i herd ner erdea!) Aside from being a very small fraction of today's favorite beverage, water has more to it than I thought; Something I thought I knew so well shows up with his whole life story at my doorstep and I think "Dude, I had no idea you were this complicated." But I digress- during this Lab, I attempted to test and understand 4 key components to the properties of water: 'cohesion', 'surface tension',  'adhesion', and 'hydrogen bonding'. Surprisingly, I found myself revisiting some middle school tactics in my spiritual journey to understand our friend, water.

That's some crazy water you guys.

     Real quick, I'd like to explain the anatomy of a water molecule. You of course know that it's proper name  is H2O. 'H' is the representation of Hydrogen, while 'O' represents Oxygen (not the Oprah Winfrey logo). Put together it looks much like a Mickey Mouse head (thank you Walt Disney!), with the H's being the two ears, and the O being the face. 

Aww Yiss, water molecule!

      I began the lab using penny and a pipette (great name for a band), to experiment the effects of cohesion. We all did this in middle school to see how water 'sticks together', which is basically the definition of cohesion. So, you can see that the water collected in a massive bubble, balanced carefully on the surface of the penny. I found that you can fit any number of drops on it, but commonly, I got around 60 droplets. The reason water clings to itself, even when you think it should spill right off, is because each water molecule can link to four others... yet those four others can link to yet again four more. Cohesion: It's an infinity loop.

Look at that talented photoshopping.

     My next stop in my spiritual journey was the town of Surface Tension-e`. But seriously, surface tension is a liquids' ability to resist an external force. This can be easily explained by asking you to apply a drop of water to a waxy science paper ( which decreases the waters adhesion powers, which I'll get to soon), and instructing you to cut the drop in half with a toothpick. Of course it only molds around and absorbs the toothpick, which is the effect of cohesion. So what I'm trying to say is that water has no armor to resist any outside forces, water is forced to take on the full blow of the toothpick and let it sink into it's body... Surface Tension, everyone.

A horrific moment of battle for Water.

     As promised I will now address Sir Adhesion. Adhesion is water's ability to stick to other things... Not itself. This could be sticking to your windshield, your umbrella or the petals on a flower (another of water's attempts at being artistic). 

 Just a picture of water trying to be all artistic by clinging dramatically to this guy's hipster glasses.

     Now I was told that Hydrogen Bond could very well be the 42 of the science universe, but I don't know how well I trust this source. In hindsight I probably should've put this paragraph somewhere closer to cohesion. I say this because cohesion is possible through hydrogen bonding. A hydrogen bond is formed when the mouse ears become attached to the head of a different water molecule, turning it into a strange Siamese Side Show act. This is more scientifically explained in this picture.

Sciency Wiency, yeah.

     In closing you might wonder how all of this information could matter to the universe. Well we all know how important trees are to the universe, and how trees need water to live. Thanks to hydrogen bonding, water can endlessly stick to itself in a chain, allowing it to pull strands of itself through the ground, roots, trunks and leaves of trees. Awesome, right? Thanks for reading this exciting episode of Splash Gordon! Does he defeat the evil Evaporator?  Find out next week, here on this blog!

Sources:

ga.water.usgs.gov

johnkyrk.com

http://www.appstate.edu/~goodmanjm/rcoe/asuscienceed/background/waterdrops/waterdrops.html