About This Project

Chemical gardens is a term coined to indicate vertically grown tubular structures formed from simple mixing of inorganic salts following inorganic chemical principles and simple physical principles. I intend to acquaint school going children to these simple chemical and physical principles in action by allowing them to witness the real-time growth of these chemical garden architectures in open air laboratory. An array of these chemical gardens would be displayed for the children.

Ask the Scientists

What is the context of this research?

The intention of the project is to help school going children to understand and appreciate the roleplay of basic chemical and physical principles in building new material architectures. I will demonstrate chemical garden growth experiment to school children from nearby schools and educate them on the relevance of the scientific principles that define natural phenomena by taking the example of chemical garden growth. Via this, the school children would be amazed to witness real-time application of simple scientific principles in creating material architectures that could ensue futuristic applications. In summary, there are not many demo experiments available to comprehend scientific principles. But, with this chemical garden growth demo, one can explain osmotic pressure, buoyancy.

What is the significance of this project?

Chemical garden kits might be available in the USA but here in India many haven't even heard of the same (chemical gardens). Though these chemical gardens appear as simple tubular structures, there is a rich interplay of complex chemistry and physics while the chemical gardens grow. With the demonstration of the real-time growth of the chemical gardens, I intend to educate school children on the role and significance of basic scientific principles such as osmotic forces, buoyancy, thermochemical radii, among other such stuff via this demo experiment. School students witnessing the real-time growth could keep them thinking on the processes that occur in nature (I would relate the chemical gardens to the hydrothermal vents so the students would appreciate the natural processes).

What are the goals of the project?

Acquainting school students to the natural processes via real-time display of basic physical principles like osmosis, buoyancy in harmless chemical systems by taking chemical garden growth as the demo experiment is the main goal of the project. Through this, inculcation of scientific temper among school students would be hopefully achieved. Overarching goal is to foster enthusiasm and questioning capacity among the students about the natural processes and their experimental mimics in the open air lab. Other meaningful goal is to trigger deep thinking in the students either by asking them questions such as 'why the chemical gardens grew vertically only and not horizontally?' during the demonstration or by providing them opportunities to ask similar questions during or after the demo.