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Challenge
Investigate how temperature changes when a pure substance melts or freezes.
Determine the melting point and the freezing point for an unknown pure
substance, and use that information to determine the most probable identity of
the substance.
Safety Precautions
Do not touch hot glassware with your bare hands.
Raise and lower the test tube in and out of the water
bath through the use of the test tube holder attached
to the support stand. Do not attempt to hold or move a
beaker with boiling water. It can easily boil over or spill
causing serious burns.
Background
Every substance has a characteristic freezing point and melting point. As you
might expect, the substance changes phase at each of these temperatures. A
pure substance will change from the solid state to the liquid state when the
temperature reaches its melting point. At a temperature equal to the
substance's freezing point, the substance will change phase from a liquid into a
solid. Determining the melting point or freezing point for an unknown substance
will often let you figure out the identity of the substance.
Consider what happens when a solid substance, for example an ice cube, melts.
Does the entire ice cube turn immediately into liquid water at some specific
moment? Or is the process more gradual? What happens to the temperature of
the ice cube while it is melting? Once the ice cube has melted, how could you
reverse the process and turn the water back into an ice cube? What temperature
conditions would you need for this to happen? This lab activity will help you
answer these questions, as well as help you determine the identity of the mystery
substance you will be melting.
Predict
Before beginning the eLab, complete the prediction portion and define the
vocabulary words on the Student Response Sheet.
Explore
Computer Setup
1. Plug the USB interfaces into the computer’s ports or USB Hub.
01 Warming+Cooling CF.ds
3. Using a hot plate, prepare a hot water bath by filling a 250-mL beaker 1/2 full
with tap water.
Record Data
1. Place the test tube that
contains the unknown solid
with sensor “A” into the water
bath. Secure it with a buret
clamp.
4. Do not move the Temperature Sensors during the initial portion of the
procedure.
5. Have a lab partner note the temperature at which the solid begins to melt.
6. When at least half of the unknown has melted, use the sensor labeled “A” to
gently stir it.
7. When the entire solid has melted, carefully raise the test tube out of the
water bath. Secure it with the clamp above the level of the beaker and off to
the side, so that any rising water vapors do not warm the test tube. Turn off
the hot plate for the duration of the experiment.
8. Continue recording temperature data as the unknown sample slowly cools and
eventually solidifies. Do not stir the sample during this portion of the
experiment.
Analyze
Record calculations in your Data Table on the Student Response Sheet as you
complete your analysis.
1. Enlarge your graph display and click the Scale-to-Fit ( ) button to best
view the data.
2. Select the Smart Tool ( ) button. Drag the Smart Tool ( ) to pinpoint
the melting temperature and the freezing temperature for your unknown
sample.
3. Record the melting temperature and freezing temperature in the Data Table
on the Student Response Sheet.
4. Use the Note Tool ( ) on the graph to label each interval in which the
sample was melting or solidifying.
5. Save your DataStudio file (on the File menu, click Save Activity As...)(on the
File menu, click Save Activity As...) to the location specified by your teacher.
Date: ____________________________________
Vocabulary
Use available resources to find the definitions of the following terms:
___________________________________________________________
freezing point:_________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
Predict
How do you think the freezing temperature of a pure substance compares to its
melting temperature? Are they identical, nearly the same, or significantly
different?
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
Data
Make a sketch of your graph of Temperature versus Time data. Label the x axis,
the y axis and the most significant features of the graph.
Record the data from the graph in the data table below. Use this information to
answer the questions that follow.
Analyze
Melting Freezing
Temperature at which phase change
occurred:
Total time needed for phase change to take
place:
Melting Freezing
Temperature at which phase change
occurred:
Total time needed for phase change to take
place:
1. From your graph, what happened to the temperature during freezing? What
happened to the temperature during melting?
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
2. According to your data and graph, what is the freezing temperature of your
pure solid? What is the melting temperature? How do they compare?
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
3. Describe how the shape of the graph indicates whether the substance is in the
solid phase, the liquid phase, or undergoing a change in its phase.
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________
Synthesize
1. Considering how energy is added to the system when heating your unknown
substance, explain the shape of the graph you observed for melting your
sample. (Hint: think about how the molecules in a solid are arranged compared
to the molecules in a liquid.)
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
2. What effect would increasing the amount of solid have on the shape of the
heating or cooling curves?
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
3. Compare your substance’s melting point to the list of chemicals and their
melting points in Table 3. Identify your unknown solid substance.
Table 3 Chemicals and melting points
Chemical Melting Point (oC)a
Lauric acid, C12H24O2 44
Thymol, 50
(CH3)(C3H7)C6H3OH
p-Dichlorobenzene, 53
C6H4Cl2
a. Source for melting point data: P.J. Linstrom and W.G. Mal-
lard, Eds., NIST Chemistry WebBook, “NIST Standard Ref-
erence Database Number 69”, July 2001, National Institute
of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD 20899
<http://webbook.nist.gov>