Bucky Badger was a perennial guest at Dr. Bassam Shakhashiri's yearly holiday-themed chemistry lecture. Watch Bucky work chemistry magic with the UW-Madison professor — always wearing his safety goggles.
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Funding for Bucky! is provided by The Dancing Goat Distillery, Robert J. Lenz, Charles H. and Barb A. Merry, Dr. Henry Anderson, Lau and Bea Christensen, Cynthia and David Shaw, Elizabeth Olson in memory of Modesta Booke Olson, the Alfred and June Kohlwey Family Foundation, donors to the Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programs and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.
Chemistry class with Bucky
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: At this time, I would like you to welcome one of the many students I have in my lab. Would you please join me in welcoming one of the students that worked in my lab? Come on out now. [audience cheers]
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: Hello, Bucky. Welcome. I am so happy to see you, Bucky. You can tell that Bucky is a very good science student because he’s wearing his goggles. Do you see that? And Bucky is also wearing a “Science is Fun!” button. Bucky, I know you are a very good student. And you plan to graduate in how many years?
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: Let me see this again. Yeah, he has four and I have five. [audience laughs] We are a little different, yes, yes. But you’re gonna graduate in four years. Everyone should try to graduate in four years. Everyone. [audience laughs] You follow Bucky’s example.
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: Bucky, I know you’ve been working on some experiments in my lab. And are you ready to show us one of the experiments you’ve been working on? You ready for Bucky to do an experiment? [audience cheers] Let’s go over there. [audience applauds]
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: What we have here is a round-bottomed flask. It is filled with ammonia gas, and there is a beaker of water here. And then, there is a tube that connects the flask to the water, there’s a small rubber bulb here, and then there is a way of connecting the ammonia gas that’s colorless and invisible with this tube here. So I’m gonna turn this, and as soon as I turn this, Bucky, you do your experiment, all right?
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: [audience exclaims] [audience laughs] So this rubber bulb that Bucky used had a little bit of water in it. A small amount of water was able to dissolve all the ammonia that’s in there, causing a partial vacuum to form up there. And then, the water from the beaker was siphoned up because the air pressure was pushing on it. [liquid gurgling]
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: Well, that’s a noise that we should avoid to make. You know that, Bucky. So, of course, we chose to show that ammonia, when it dissolves in water, it forms a base. And so, we put an indicator there, a dye that shows the red color of the indicator. And, of course, we chose red for a reason. You know that, right? What reason is that? Bucky Badger! [audience cheers and applauds]
Bassam Z. Shakhashiri: Bucky, I know… I know because you are a good student and final exams are coming up, you have to go study and make sure you do well on the final exams. So best wishes to you and thank you so much, Bucky, for coming. Thank you so much. [audience cheers and applauds]
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