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Paramagnetism of Liquid Oxygen

  • Page ID
    131420
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    Required Training

    Required PPE

    UC Lab Safety Fundamentals

    Lab coat, safety glasses/goggles, nitrile gloves

    Equipment

    Chemicals

    House built strong magnet set up

    Liquid O2 generator (small tank of O2, small dewar, styrofoam container, pasteur pipette with rubber tubing, test tube with clamp.)

    Small Erlenmeyer flask with H2O

    Liquid nitrogen

    Procedure:

    1. Fill the styrofoam container with liquid N2 and insert the test tube in the liquid N2
    2. Submerge the pasteur pipette in the Erlenmeyer with water and turn the valve on the O2 tank until a slow, steady stream bubbles through the water (not too fast or else the O2 will not condense)
    3. Place the Pasteur pipette in the test tube and wait until ~5 mL of liquid O2 is produced (5-10 min). Note the blue color.
    4. Pour some liquid N2 over the magnet faces to demonstrate that N2 is not paramagnetic. This will also cool the magnet.
    5. Using the clamp to handle the test tube, pour the liquid O2 down the face of one magnet. If it is poured in the gap between the magnets, the O2 will most likely fall through and not be caught in the magnetic field.

    Discussion:

    The paramagnetism observed for O2 is due to the presence of 2 unpaired electrons in the π* molecular orbitals.

    Hazards:

    Liquid O2 and Liquid N2 are cryogenic. Liquid O2 is also a strong oxidizer. Care must be used when hand cryogenics. Keep liquid O2 away from ignition sources.

    SOP:

    N/A

    Disposal (by Storeroom)

    N/A


    Paramagnetism of Liquid Oxygen is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by LibreTexts.

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