Growing heart-shaped crystals

Safe­ty pre­cau­tions

Warn­ing! Only un­der adult su­per­vi­sion.

Equip­ment

• alum;
• boil­ing wa­ter;
• food col­or­ings;
• pipe clean­ers;
• fish­ing line;
• spoon;
• wood­en stick;
• col­or­less nail pol­ish.

Step-by-step in­struc­tions

Bend a pipe clean­er into a heart shape and tie it to a fish­ing line on a wood­en stick. Then, dis­solve some alum in boil­ing wa­ter and add food col­or­ing. Im­merse the “heart” in the pre­pared so­lu­tion and leave for 6 hours. Af­ter a while, rinse the re­sult­ing heart in wa­ter, blot with a pa­per tow­el, and coat with col­or­less nail pol­ish. Your gift is ready!

Process de­scrip­tion

As the so­lu­tion cools, the wa­ter par­tial­ly evap­o­rates and the alum be­gins to crys­tal­lize on the sur­face of the pipe clean­er, form­ing neat, beau­ti­ful geo­met­ric crys­tals.

Cool ex­per­i­ments are wait­ing for you in the MEL Chem­istry sub­scrip­tion!