Why is specific heat useful

In storage heaters, where the relevant substance remains in the heater, solids such as clay bricks or ceramic materials are preferred, as they do not leak or corrode their containers, although their lower specific heat capacity means that they have to be raised to a very high temperature to supply useful heating over several hours.

For 33 Resources. Class practical: Measuring the specific thermal capacity also called the specific heat capacity of aluminium, including the Practical Activity Class practical: Using an aluminium block and immersion heater to estimate the specific thermal capacity also called the It seems intuitive that, when energy is added to a system, its temperature will rise. Hence, the notion of negative heat Water has a high specific heat, meaning it takes more energy to increase the temperature of water compared to other substances.

This is why water is valuable to industries and in your car's radiator as a coolant. The high specific heat of water also helps regulate the rate at which air changes temperature, which is why the temperature change between seasons is gradual rather than sudden, especially near the oceans.

This same concept can be expanded to a world-wide scale. The oceans and lakes help regulate the temperature ranges that billions of people experience in their towns and cities. Water surrounding or near cities take longer to heat up and longer to cool down than do land masses, so cities near the oceans will tend to have less change and less extreme temperatures than inland cities.

This property of water is one reason why states on the coast and in the center of the United States can differ so much in temperature patterns. A Midwest state, such as Nebraska, will have colder winters and hotter summers than Oregon, which has a higher latitude but has the Pacific Ocean nearby. If you leave a bucket of water outside in the sun in summer it will certainly get warm, but not hot enough to boil an egg.

But, if you walk barefoot on the black asphalt of a street in the southern portion of the United States in August, you'll burn your feet. Dropping an egg on the metal of my car hood on an August day will produce a fried egg. Metals have a much lower specific heat than water. If you've ever held onto a needle and put the other end in a flame you know how fast the needle gets hot, and how fast the heat is moved through the length of the needle to your finger.

Not so with water. The high specific heat of water has a great deal to do with regulating extremes in the environment. For instance, the fish in this pond are happy because the specific heat of the water in the pond means the temperature of the water will stay relatively the same from day to night. They don't have to worry about either turning on the air conditioner or putting on their woolen flipper gloves. Also, for happy fish, check out our page on Dissolved Oxygen. Lucky for me, you, and the fish in the pond to the right, water has a higher specific heat than many other substances.

One of water's most significant properties is that it takes a lot of energy to heat it. The relationship between heat and temperature change is usually expressed in the form shown below where c is the specific heat.

A gold compound shifts from a visible fluorescence to emitting infrared when ground — a big shift with potential applications in bioimaging and security inks. The infrared emissions are invisible to the naked eye. In fact, melting is the oldest method to purify gold with fire. However, since the melting temperature of gold is degrees centigrade, melting at this point leads to high risks of severe burns. What chemicals are utilized to melt gold? To melt gold, generally, an acid mixture aqua regia or royal water is used.

We will however still outline the disadvantages of melting gold without flux. Impurities in Gold for ingot casting: Without metal oxide capturing flux, metal impurities will stick to the precious metal. This will lead to the casting of impure gold bars and ingots. A propane flame is hot enough to melt pure gold.

It will also melt gold alloys but the melting process does not separate gold from other elements, like silver or copper. Real, pure gold, when exposed to the flame, will get brighter after a while as it gets hotter, but will not darken.

Gold leaf is gold that is beaten into very thin sheets, then typically applied to the surface of an object to make it look like it is made out of gold.

You can melt down gold leaf, however, because it is extremely thin, you would need to melt down a lot of it to come up with any significant quantity of purified gold. Melting gold leaf is no different to gold dust it will melt fine!

Because its so thin you need a huge amount to make up a gram. So when melted it may look like it burnt off but just reduced drastically in size when condensed. Using distilled water, clean the surface gently, removing any dust, dirt or accumulated grime on the surface. Scrape the gold leaf.