Chain Reactions

Experiment Title:

Flap Butterfly Flap!

Objective:

Learn about Chain Reactions

Background on Chain Reactions:

First, what is a chain reaction? We know that a reaction is when you have some sort of input like putting baking soda and vinegar together to create some sort of output such as the creation of carbon dioxide, water and sodium acetate. In this case we are talking about a chemical reaction with a single step. Now think about a chemical reaction that requires many steps to get to your output. If we were to put in all of the materials that you need to go from the starting materials to the ending materials and the only outside force that you need is the addition of heat you could create a chain reaction. This would mean that the first materials react, then their product reacts with the next materials and so on and so forth until you have gotten to the final product. Another example of a chain reaction could be the chain reaction that occurs when your parents bring you home from school to the time that you have dinner. In this chain reaction you follow a series of events or steps to get from the point at which you arrive home to the point at which dinner is ready and on the table. Think about making dinner (even if you parents’ simply get dinner out of the freezer and heat it up), making dinner requires several steps to complete. One step leads to another step which leads to another step and so on and so forth until you have completed your chain reaction. 

Over hundreds of years many different theories have arisen from the idea of how chain reactions require very specific input to create the proper outcome. Small changes can lead to great changes in outcome. This is known as the Butterfly Effect - the phenomenon whereby a minute localized change in a complex system can have large effects elsewhere. This idea comes from a Butterfly flapping its wings in Japan and causing a Typhoon in California. The location does not matter, but the idea is that a butterfly by having some impact on its environment can cause a chain of reactions to occur that ultimately leads to something large happening such as a typhoon in California. Think about our dinner example and your mom sending your dad out to the grocery store for green cabbage, your dad comes back with purple cabbage instead. This seems like a very minor change, cabbage is cabbage and having a different color it not a big deal, but with the Butterfly Effect the purple cabbage change leads to complaints from your siblings about what mom is making for dinner, this stresses mom out and makes her change the meal from stuffed cabbage to spring rolls. This causes mom to get out the fryer, which she heats up to 350 F. Suddenly dad comes in asking when the stuffed cabbage will be ready, mom is so distraught that she accidentally sticks her hand in the fryer and gets severely burned. Now all of you go without dinner and spend the night in the hospital. Dad made what seemed like a very minor change that lead to a very different outcome for everyone. This is a bit of an exaggeration but demonstrates the overall idea of the Butterfly Effect as it relates to chain reactions.

With any chain reaction the input and output can vary greatly based on small changes. A Rube Goldberg machine is a deliberately complex contraption in which a series of devices that perform simple tasks are linked together to produce a domino effect in which activating one device triggers the next device in the sequence. The expression is named after American cartoonist and inventor of such contraptions, Rube Goldberg. This type of machine requires a single input that leads to a bunch of subsequent steps and has a very simple output. The goal of our experiment today will be to demonstrate chain reactions through building our own Rube Goldberg Machine, but with each group creating their own portion of the machine out of different materials.

Materials

• Keva Planks
• Dominoes
• Goldie-Blocks Sets
• Gears
• Balls
• Cars
• Train Tracks

Method

Prepare Experiment

1. Determine which materials you want to use for your chain reaction
2. Start building your chain reaction at one edge of your lab surface and have it run across to the other end of the lab surface
3. Test each component of your chain reaction as you build to make sure the reaction will work all the way across the table

Run Experiment

1. With a teachers or parents help interconnect all of the different chain reactions into one large chain reaction and see what happens
2. If the chain reaction fails at any point work as a class to figure out a way to fix it and get the chain reaction to work

Analyze Data

1. Look at your finished chain reaction and see if you were able to complete a full chain reaction or if there were some chinks in your chain
2. Do you think those chinks can be fixed?
3. How would you change it to make the chain reaction more successful?

Conclusions

Chain reactions are super cool. They can be applied to chemical processes or to different things that you do every day. When you understand a chain reaction you can understand how when one part of that reaction is unsuccessful that your chain reaction may not be so successful. Taking a step back and seeing how that specific part of the chain reaction can allow you to fix your issues and to make sure your chain reaction is successful.

Make It Your Own

Now that we have created a large chain reaction as a class, go back to the beginning and create your own chain reaction. Is it easier or harder to create your own chain reaction? Is it easier or harder solve issues that arise with your chain reaction when you are not working in a large group? Think about your answers, the bigger and more complicated a system becomes the more important it is to understand every facet of that system, but that can become very difficult for one person to do, so if you divvy up the work a bit you can make sur that every part of that chain reaction is successful and if one part fails you have knowledge of what is going on and have an expert on that part to make sure that you can correct any issues that arise.

Extension Activities to do at home

Now think about chain reactions that you have at home every day and talk to your parents about how those chain reactions work. Think about in the morning, a chain reaction may be set off by your mom and dad when they wake you up in the morning and ends with you arriving at school. What different steps have to occur from you waking up to you arriving at school? If one of those things does not happen, does it change your chain reaction outcome? What things can you do to make this chain reaction more successful and efficient?