[Rockhounds] Heavy Water in the Bucket (OT)

[DonH]

The Hammer wrote:

> Don,
> 
> Just curious.  What would you do in the demos with the heavy water?
> 


1.  Fill a 5 mL beaker with each type, then put them on a balance, and 
watch the side with the d. water drop lower.  Same volume, both water, 
but the d. water is denser because of the isotope.

2.  Freeze some of it in a little plastic bag and watch it sink, vs. 
normal water in a plastic bag which will float.

3.  I haven't done this yet, but put some in a liquid prism and observe 
the dispersion and refractive index vs. distilled water.

That's about it, without going nuclear.  However it might be possible to 
put a bottle of it between a low-level radioactive mineral and a geiger 
counter, vs. normal water, but it would take some experimentation to 
find a mineral that works well with this to the point you can detect the 
d. water shields better.  Someone with a background in the specialty can 
probably do some calculations that will give a good first-order 
approximation of what it would take to make this a useful demonstration. 
  That's an experiment for another day.