In the typical “cookbook” experiment comparing the radiation absorption rates of different colored surfaces, students' hands are commonly used as a measurement instrument to demonstrate that dull black and silvery surfaces are good and poor absorbers of radiation, respectively. However, college students are often skeptical about using their bare hands in this experiment because they learned in early science lessons that skin is not a reliable detector of heat transfer. Moreover, when the experiment is conducted in a school laboratory, it is often difficult for students to perceive the slight differences in heat transfer on the dull black and silvery aluminum leaves attached to their hands. Rather than replacing students' bare hands with such sophisticated apparatus as a data logger and temperature probe, I suggest using a simple (and delicious!) low-cost instrument, i.e., chocolate, which simply melts when it receives radiation.
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December 2015
PAPERS|
December 01 2015
The ‘Chocolate Experiment’ - A Demonstration of Radiation Absorption by Different Colored Surfaces
Dennis Fung
Dennis Fung
The University of Hong Kong
, Pok Fu Lam, Hong Kong
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Phys. Teach. 53, 545–547 (2015)
Citation
Dennis Fung; The ‘Chocolate Experiment’ - A Demonstration of Radiation Absorption by Different Colored Surfaces. Phys. Teach. 1 December 2015; 53 (9): 545–547. https://doi.org/10.1119/1.4935767
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