Slow Motion Contact Explosive - Nitrogen Triiodide

[@wannahockachewie897]

A bit disappointed there was no footage of a mosquito being blown to smithereens.

[@vampyricon7026]

+

[@michael636336]

We then, opportunity knocks. Make some NI3.NH3 and put some out where the mosquitoes land. If you don't like the KZbin videos, make some of your own.

[@SedatKPunkt]

yeah...that's why I've watched it until the end... :(

[@anch95]

+

[@everettamador9885]

Haven't found any Kamikaze Mosquitoes...YET!

[@JaredReabow]

a mosquito can set it off you say? I am going to make a bunch of this and lather it on myself then stay very still, mosquitoes beware!

[@laharl2k]

+Jared Reabow (Jazza) that'll probably do it. I really hate when they come buzz near my ears while i sleep

[@da12ius]

+Laharl Krichevskoy laughing uproariously.. mrrzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.. BOOM!

[@Shaggy2286]

+Jared Reabow (Jazza) LOL If only it worked that way, it'd be awesome! Unfortunately the mosquito would set off a chain reaction setting it all off at the speed of sound and say goodby to whatever is touching the stuff. It'd be better to rig a container of the stuff to a light source or add some attractant to it basically making an extremely overpowered, single shot bug zapper.... er bug boomer. ^_^

[@AnonEyeMouse]

+Shaggy2286 I wonder if it would detonate? what would the reaction be when it came into contact with oil and sweat from the skin?

[@TheGribbleNator]

+AnonEyeMouse It would detonate. Not only are your muscles prone to random twitches beyond your control, but your body is very warm compared to the solution. The heat from your body would more than likely be enough energy to set off the reaction.

[@Vophren]

Your flash of light is plasma radiance. Your explosive force is probably fast enough to create a small zone of gas rarification, bringing a local area under the paschen curve. I'm not sure if the NI3 is covalent or ionic, but when you split it with the explosion you're not creating a reaction product. You're creating N and I ions. When you release these to a high pressure gas, the gases are going to source electrons at the nanometer scale to the more electronegative halogen, Iodine. This will happen at lengths under 1 nm - the electron doesn't need to form a bond to get pulled in. The electron will fall down through states and release a specific wavelength of light that is determined by the electronic band gap of the iodine. Granted, you would need to pick up an optical spectrometer and measure the wavelength output. Experimentally, contact Ocean Optics in florida - their gas chromatography systems are

[@shreeganesh441]

NI3 must possibly be covalent according to Fajans rule.

[@michael636336]

NI3 is covalent.

[@michael636336]

BS Chemistry UCB

[@wannabegeek2840]

In short it is struck while releasing vapours of Iodine

[@justmeisthatok7990]

Hmm. I like your thoughts. I guessed maybe static electricity spark from the speed..but..there's something wrong with that idea more I think about it..not sure what but my intuition is calling myself out

[@Beibyface]

Quick question: How do you pour it onto the paper without it exploding?

[@sbalogh53]

+Mikkel F. Lerche ... You make the stuff using iodine crystals and concentrated ammonia solution. While the Nitrogen triiodide is moist it is fairly stable. When it dries out on the filter paper then it becomes unstable.

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

+Mikkel F. Lerche You make it in solution, and then leave it to dry out. While it’s still wet, the water stabilises the molecule, then it’s good to blow once it’s dry.

[@ShonkyLegs]

+The Royal Institution Clever!

[@Fuchsia_tude]

+The Royal Institution Note: do not actually blow on the substance once it's dry.

[@science_and_anonymous]

when you make it "which I have before" it is very wet and must dry. via why they used a coffe filter. in this wet state it can not detonate. once it dries well BOOM!

[@MetalFan10101]

There has just been a huge explosion in Beirut, Lebanon. As I was watching, this appeared in the related videos. Very strange, the smoke does look similar.

[@tylerstillday9997]

This seems more purple to me than red.

[@tonycook1624]

@@tylerstillday9997 The ammonium nitrate explosion in Lebanon produces a brown gas - nitrogen dioxide. Nitrogen triiodide shown in this video is producing iodine vapour - which is intensely purple, The explosive substances you are confusing are two entirely different molecules

[@tylerstillday9997]

@@tonycook1624 Could some of the colour be explained by the surrounding soil and the angle of the sun?

[@tonycook1624]

@@tylerstillday9997 Which of the explosions are you referring to? The dominant colour in the gas cloud from any ammonium nitrate detonation is dense nitrogen dioxide - in high concentration this gas is deep reddy-brown. Soil and light effects makes little impact in the initial view of the detonation - gas is incredibly light and moves outwards way way faster that any shower of soil etc - that shower is seen many seconds later only when the gas rapidly thins out. The expanding white cloud seen traveling out very fast (and in a spherical form) is condensed water vapour on the shock wave front. Nitrogen triiodide decomposes to nitrogen gas (colourless), iodine vapour - deep purple. A very little of the nitrogen triiodide/ammonia complex is vapourised by the heat and escapes detonation - thats an orange brown colour. The initial material is not pure nitrogen triiodide but a 1:1 complex of nitrogen triiodide and ammonia (NI3.NH3). You make it by stirring iodine crystals in a saturated solution of ammonia in water. This creates a crumbly black substance (NI3.NH3) which is stable when wet but on drying is incredibly shock sensitive. Alpha particles emitted from a radioactive source is sufficient to detonate it!!!

[@thomasdelvin3683]

@@tonycook1624 i saw red in beirut and some footage that looked altered

[@unvergebeneid]

"Nitrogen triiodide is so unstable that even something like a mosquito landing on it can set it off." Incidentally, these nitrogen tiiodide explosions also look _exactly_ like what I wish would happen to any mosquito that robs me of my sleep.

[@idon.t2156]

Make a night cream of it. You won't be disturbed anymore..,...

[@heha3525]

@@idon.t2156bro you answered him 8 YEARS LATER😭 I don't even think he has this problem anymore

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

Lots of you have asked how we make the powder in the first place if it's so volatile. Kate answers that question, and considers whether you could set the explosion off just by clapping your hands nearby, in our new monthly mailbag series. Check it out: kzbin.info/www/bejne/eJa1nWiXi66ljNE

[@jaredgarden2455]

Surely the reason for the flashes would be the generation of heat from the formation of N2. gaseous nitrogen requires alot of energy to split (lightning) and so the formation of gaseous nitrogen would generate alot of energy.

[@DirtyRobot]

I would suggest super cavitation of the air.

[@DirtyRobot]

Easy test would be to set the reaction off in a vacuum chamber or under a few atmospheres of pressure to see the results.

[@user21XXL]

guys plz dont use brittle ceramics with explosives

[@jaredgarden2455]

user21XXL why would anyone be using ceramics for such a test, i would personally be doing such a test inside a large acrylic glove box with probably 0.2g ish of nitrogen triiodide on filter paper placed atop a peice of wood, you could easily mix the ammonia and iodine in the glove box and filter it without any problems, not sure what kind of pressure/vacuum an acrylic glove box can handle but i suspect vacuum would be safer maybe under 15mmHg.

[@gusbisbal9803]

So the flashes are decays of excited electrons. The question then is what pushes them up into the exited state. So that means they can be excited by radiation, kinetic transfer of heat, chemical excitation ie. through electron excitement from the change in electron energy through bond re-arrangement or a combination of these. To check you would have to check its wave length and that can be done by doing the reaction in the dark and getting its spectrum or putting a really small amount in a spectrometer and reacting it but lets face it that may hurt the spectrometer. However once you have the spectrum you will be able to know the energy decay. From that you can determine a few options as to which electron decay it could be. There may be more than one. From those options you can postulate whether it was chemical, which would be the easiest to determine and also how much heat would be needed to get that particular excitation to happen. However neither of these are proof of the true cause. You could do the reaction in liquid nitrogen and if it still emits light the chances of it being chemical instead of heat is higher but still not proof. Hmmm... this is a tough one.

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

+gus bisbal Trying to do the reaction in liquid nitrogen sounds very interesting/fun. Not sure about the practicalities of it, though…

[@DutchPhlogiston]

+gus bisbal Getting the emission spectrum will tell you how the electrons come down to the ground state, not by what mechanism they went up before that.

[@gusbisbal9803]

DutchPhlogiston Read my post properly. The spectrum will determine the energy of the decay, ie where the electrons were energetically.There is only a very precise set of possible energetic electron energy levels that can be achieved. So if you know the wave length you know which one/s they were pushed into. This tells you a lot about the mechanism considering that where they got pushed is the only clue you will get as to what pushed them there.

[@gusbisbal9803]

The Royal Institution get the past a fair amount of it, carefully pour liquid N2 over it again and again till the N2 evaporates. Remember it doesn't have to be immersed in Liquid N2 just as cold as Liquid N2. If you give it say 30 mins under N2 it will will get pretty cold and then once the excess N2 has almost gone, set it off with a small electrical discharge. or tap it like usual.

[@soreff]

Very much agreed - the first thing that I would try too is to get a spectrum. Two points: - To get a crude spectrum just sticking a cheap plastic diffraction grating in front of the camera should suffice. - The simplest thing a spectrum would tell us is whether it looks like a smooth blackbody radiation spectrum or something with a sharper peak. If it is just a blackbody spectrum then it may be just thermal. But if it shows a sharper peak, it might be chemiluminescence from some interesting excited intermediate in the detonation...

[@Thunderf00t]

fascinating... genuinely fascinating! its something I'd been meaning to do for a long time.....I even bought some sausages to set it off with... to emulate a human finger! but your footage is superb! Still kinda weird how your NI3 explosion produces an opaque cloud, while your iodine on a hotplate is a clear purple gas! If I remember rightly though.... thermodynamically this is a damn peculiar explosive.

[@EpicB]

+Thunderf00t Perhaps iodine cloud from the explosion isn't as "pure" as the gas you'd get from just heating iodine.

[@OldMrSarvy]

+Thunderf00t do it! just do it!

[@fifazockersambat]

+Thunderf00t found your channel two days ago been watching your videos all day, switch to something else, and suddenly you're there again.

[@Ziellos]

perhaps it also produces nitrogen oxides? its brown in aq soln too, maybe a direction. im interested in the strange sparking prior to the detonation reaction. seems like a good candidate for very high speed video.

[@EpicB]

Lo Tek Since there's no oxygen in the structure, I don't think it could produce nitrogen oxides.

[@progtom7585]

Who else got sent here after Beirut explosion...

[@brainwashingdetergent4128]

The red cloud looks very Similar to the one in Beirut.

[@kenredington4988]

Yep just found this. Wonder if normal fertilizer can degrade to this stuff?

[@ripntear8487]

What is the connection?

[@brainwashingdetergent4128]

@@ripntear8487 only the red smoke cloud

[@progtom7585]

@@ripntear8487 the youtube algorithm served it to me after watching Beirut explosion content... is all

[@Sol92692]

This video will be extra relevant today.....

[@TheSaltyEgo]

And today

[@ThePaulv12]

I made it years ago with my teenage son and it was a great deal of fun.The excitement, the laughing, the wonder and the trying to understand the chemical bonds. IIRC was ridiculously easy to make but the waiting part - particularly second time 'round was hilarious. The poking the prodding LOL.

[@jhyland87]

1:59 Watching that in slow motion is awesome. It totally looks like it's actually a very big explosion playing at regular speed.

[@NevinWilliams71]

Try capturing the flash through a diffraction grating; if there's clues to be had on the specific origin of the light, that will surely help.

[@ABytheway]

Perhaps if you do the explosion in the dark, the light emitted could be much more noticeable. If this is the case then you may be able to calculate the wavelength of light by directing some of it through a diffraction grating and filming the diffraction pattern in slow motion (or using a sensitive photographic film with multiple explosions to build up the image). This wavelength can then be converted into an energy, which may reveal more about how the electrons are positioned in the molecule.

[@carbonart3362]

i'm here looking for explosions similar to the one in beirut

[@carbonart3362]

@@silliezt_toxiqu3 Thanks! apparently the reddish dust in beirut is from other stuff in the warehouse, not the ammonium nitrate. Ammonium nitrate produces yellow smoke. it's the dust that was bothering me

[@domvasta]

dark room, set up a diffraction grating and incredibly sensitive photographic film, CCD or CMOS sensor and see what wavelengths are produced, if it's due to heat, it should have a black body spectrum minus the iodine and nitrogen peaks, if it's electron excitation and emission you'll see something else.

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

You can now watch this video with Portuguese subtitles! Thanks to the fantastic viewer who contributed them. Obrigado! If you speak another language and want to submit a translation, click here: kzbin.info_video?v=DFfRqoIdArM

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

+The Royal Institution And now it's in French too! Merci beaucoup! Keep them coming you brilliant multilingual people!

[@LuisBrudna]

:-)

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

We now have not one, but two Spanish sets of subtitles here too! Gracias!

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

Now available in Korean as well, thank you!

[@RaExpIn]

I always wanted to see this reaction in slow motion, since I had the chance to work with it! Very nice video! And I like the way of explanation.

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

+Random Experiments International Thanks, Glad you like it :)

[@peterblake4837]

Hi, you can see similar flashes when heating crystalline material. I think it is due to energy released by breaking stressed bonds. Spectacular in a dark room, and even better when seen through a microscope. I recommend using a cheap objective lense.

[@russellgill3226]

Finally, someone got it right after 7 years.

[@jdublu100]

You will note that all the substance shown was on filter paper. This product is almost inert when wet or damp, and safe to handle. When I was at the University of Illinois, they had a problem with a student making about 5 grams of this and leaving it in their chem drawer the last day of the semester. When the TA came through and cleaned out the drawers a week later, they lost a couple of fingers when they opened the drawer with the 5 grams in it.

[@garydzidowski1134]

Even under DI water, it will detonate if stirred to vigorously. Personal experience.

[@chemdemos3292]

i was just going to say something similar - I got five stiches in my hand from that terrible assumption@@garydzidowski1134

[@OklaBamaPickens]

Will this damage anything other than the paper it's on?

[@prod_by_lukxn]

Beirut, Lebanon anyone?

[@colemiller8685]

Different chemical compound. Much larger boom

[@Titanic-wo6bq]

Which of these things would trigger it to explode? 1. Ant walking on it. 2. Talking onto it. 3. Screaming in the same room as it. 4. Breathing on it 5. Drawing on it very lightly.

[@john_hunter_]

How do you even make that stuff if it's so unstable?

[@gusbisbal9803]

+John Hunter I was thinking the same thing and I suspect that its held in solution and applied to the paper through either crystallisation or just drying it. Still you would want to do it pretty slowly and without moving it.

[@bobfl42]

+John Hunter I remember when I was a kid making some ammonium iodide and whilst it is wet and in a paste separating it into pin head pieces letting the dry out well away from each other.

[@MrPsybertron]

+John Hunter We could tell you, but then we'd have to kill you. Back in school days we used to let solution dry out on filter paper and leave pieces to dry on the corridor floors. What fun. Don't think we maimed anyone?

[@john_hunter_]

Ian Glendinning That's hilarious.

[@rwired]

+John Hunter very carefully

[@scottk3292]

I'm wondering how this compares with ammonium triiodide. What about triboluminescence for the light generated during the explosion?

[@GWAIHIRKV]

That’s the one. Used to make 😬

[@jeanhodgson8623]

I did do this at home, back in the 1960s. You mix some iodine crystals into some ammonia, and let them dry. You could buy that back then. The "peace and safety" crowd would freak if I had this today. Or, I would be arrested as a "terrorist". I only made a small amount of it. We used to sprinkle it on the garage floor and stamp on it. It banged. Some of it remained, and my Dad complained about it crackling under his feet whenever he went into the garage for several days afterward. The funniest thing was that my friend's German shepherd scratched at some of it and barked furiously at it. On another occasion, I hurled a 2" cube of sodium into a huge puddle in our back yard. There was a huge explosion, and, of course, the puddle would become sodium hydroxide. Next day, our cat drank out of the puddle. It didn't harm her. The authorities today would have a stroke if they heard this. Idiots. I would love to see their pious reaction. It would be like the time when I told a U.K. driving instructor that I once went from second gear to fifth.

[@danforbess6941]

We used to make this stuff in chemistry class ( when the teacher left the room) , as long as it stays damp it's relatively inert, but let it dry out and WOAH NELLIE it's touchy!

[@Naomi_Boyd]

It looks like the flashes of light are jumping between points of glowing material. I would postulate that they are electrical in nature instead of heat induced. Electrons could be jumping around during molecular recombination, forming sparks or arcs of plasma between polarized clumps of atoms. If that is the case, the arcs would cause detectable disruptions when detonated within an electromagnetic field.

[@Naomi_Boyd]

apburner1 Is moooshsquooosh a technical term? I think I prefer eV.

[@SteamPunkPhysics]

+Richy Rich He does mention that it's propagation at the speed of sound in a crystalline solid so perhaps it's the piezoelectric effect?

[@MooMinIL]

+Richy Rich My thoughts exactly, perhaps a good way to research this hypothesis is to do a spectroscopic analysis of the flashes, the only question is how. I'd think that normal spectroscopic methods might be too slow, maybe direct do an old type of spectroscopy using a slit for the light from the flashes which would pass though a prism and hit a calibrated screen, resulting in a spectroscopic image, what do you guys think?

[@nickhill9445]

Absolutely. Thinking about it, it is perhaps strange that light emission from bonding or breaking of bonds doesn't more regularly emit visible photons since bonds are phenomena related to energy levels of electrons and photon emission is the means by which electrons lose their energy when they return to ground state.

[@iholland]

Thanks for bringing back memories of playing with stuff years ago. If they're small plasma arcs, they will result in RF, detectable in the same way lightning is - an LF receiver tuned to a relatively quiet area of the band should produce an audible click if this is the case. Piezoelectric effects is an interesting theory. There's a fair range of colours so I think it is less likely to be caused be changes in energy levels; plus if most of electrons in these atoms are experiencing a jump in level, I'd expect a very obvious visible flash rather than just a few sparkles.

[@lasagnahog7695]

The light is formed when magic is temporarily separated from the iodine and when it is absorbed back in it excites the Ether causing spontaneous creation of photons.

[@Bob3D2000]

This video has prompted me to share your channel on Facebook. Thanks, RI!

[@boogieknee3781]

This brings back memories.... Our chem teacher was meant to be using copper shavings and dilute nitric acid to make nitro iodide. He improvised by using copper powder and concentrated nitric acid. Put the powder in a large test tube....added the acid....very limited reaction until he shook the tube and of course it fizzed everywhere. We mopped up the mess ......but as it dried out ....anywhere it touched any kind of friction triggered an explosive spark. What was funny was watching a fly land in a puddle of it for a sip and seeing it leave the table at 'terminal velocity' in several different directions when it rubbed its legs together.

[@unchosenid]

The NI3 is insensitive while it is wet with the ammonia solution. Once it dries though it is VERY sensitive. Most people will say that "touching" it sets it off, but this is incorrect. It is the friction of the feather rubbing against it that sets it off. In HS I noticed this. So what I'd do is take a wet clay ball, poke a hole into it, fill it with wet NI3 and then pinched it shut, making sure that the NI3 inside was securely held and could not "rattle" around on the inside. Squeezing it to make sure the clay was in full contact with it. Then I would just set it down and let it dry. Once dry I tested it by rolling it around and shaking it while holding it with something other than my hand. You could then handle it, but if you tossed it and it broke open it would go off. It was fun.

[@AurelTristen]

Maybe I'm way of the ranch here, but this caught my eye because the explosions look shockingly like full sized ones many many times larger. I would LOVE to get high resolution footage of these explosions at high speed to use for visual effects, but don't worry, I won't even try doing this 'at home.'

[@bardfinn]

Well, the video is creative commons by-noncommercial-sharealike!

[@subductionzone]

I still remember a high school chemistry class where the previous class had made some of this in the lab portion of their class. When I put my lab book down on a "clean" counter I heard some small pops and there were a few small purplish stains from individual small crystals of this stuff exploding upon contact on my lab book. I guess the previous class did not clean up as well as they should have. Sadly we never go to make this in any of my classes.

[@Fiyaaaahh]

Best fly trap ever :) Please mass produce & sell it to my local retailer

[@TCSC47]

A friend of mine who was a technician at a university chemistry department had to make some compound that may have been NI3 or something very similar. He was evaporating the moisture out of it in a large flask over heat. He was supposed to stop before it was completely dry. Very unfortunately he took off his googles to see how it was progressing and at that moment the flask exploded and shredded his corneas and lenses. Last I met him he had had several cornea transplants but they had not taken. He was entitled to some compensation from the university because he had been instructed to make the substance, but because it was his decision to take off his googles, the insurance company cut his compensation by half. Three lessons -- activities like this are not games. - insurance companies are bastards. - always wear eye protection!! Loosing a finger is liveable with. Blindness is life changing.

[@dougaltolan3017]

Is this what I know of as fulminate of iodine?

[@Durrdalus]

An easy solution to see more of what's going on with the flash would be to rent a Phantom high speed cam or collab a video with a channel like The Slow Mo Guys. Phantoms go a lot higher than only 59K fps.

[@fredrichenning1367]

Any and every college chemistry student knows how to make this stuff. The secret to a "big bang" is to get the "stuff" perfectly dry, otherwise only the drier crystals will explode blowing the rest hither and yon. That happened to me one day at the Oshkosh airport way back when. I had put a pretty good-sized lump out on the apron, but when I went to hit it with a stick, it simply blew apart with a sharp "snap". What I did not reckon with was that all the "small pieces" still existed where they had landed. When our DC-3 came in later in the day and turned around, the dust set off all those tiny pieces in rapid succession. It was like the 4th of July.... the waiting passengers wondered what the hell THAT was. I never told them.

[@ryklatortuga4146]

Science Baby!That was NIII on excellent.

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

+Ryk Latortuga Thanks. We do tri.

[@paulcurley3164]

+The Royal Institution Get in contact with the slomo guys and see if you can use their phantom camera which records extremely slow. might show more than what you can already see

[@rsingh2083]

+The Royal Institution If its so difficult to hold them together in a bond, then why/how do they even get formed in the first place ?

[@bitterlemonboy]

its writed I3N

[@kenwodlinger4220]

As a high school chemistry teacher I would occasionally save this reaction for a treat at the end of the last class before a holiday. Kind of a bribe, you could say. The twist was that I’d smear the damp NI3 into disks of filter paper which I’d suspend from the ight fixtures. The compound being dry by the end of class, I’d let the students take turns shooting elastic bands at the disks. Needless to say, lots of fun all way around.

[@HiwasseeRiver]

At 2:30 you can see the pile light up in all areas. I suspect it is a multi step rxn and the first steps are some sort of combustion or slow decomp, then the rxn rate accelerates due to the temp increase. One thought - conduct the rxn initiation in an argon purged environment to see if the N2, CO2 or O2 in air participate in the decomp initiation. Since you like purple explosives take a look at Lithium Nitride - similar decomp behavior however the Li ion is much smaller than the Iodine ion - food for thought.

[@Ravinius]

It is important to note that nitrogen triiodine is not reactive when wet, and as such should be dealt with when wet, and allowed to dry before detonating. for anybody interested, the reason this happens is because the iodine atoms which are extremely large relative to the single nitrogen atom create very unstable bonding angles, that can break and set off a chain reaction very easily, however when combined with water the molecule is more stable.

[@jamesbong4978]

Looks like the same coloured smoke in the Lebanon explosion that happened

[@BritishBeachcomber]

That was Ammonium Nitrate fertilizer

[@dexterkardas6559]

This is the perfect experiment to get kids into chemistry or science in general. Seeing something like this is great but knowing the physics behind it is way cooler.

[@emanonmax]

For the explanation of the light: When electrons fall from a higher orbital into a lower they realease electromagnetic waves (light if they are in a certain range of wavelength). And sincs electrons move around in this explosion this is the most likely explanation. A way to test this would be analysing the spectrum of the light and comparing it against the typical wavelength emitted by Nitrogen or Iodine. This is common procedure in (astro-)physics and I think asking a physics professor would greatly help. (My assumption is that you have some degree in chemistry rather than physics).

[@EpicNexusStudios]

I never got to take a chemistry class but my hypothesis as to the volatility of this compound is this : external pressure is exciting the three iodine molecules together so fast it creates a resonance or friction strong enough to upset the nitrogen molecule, causing it to decay fast enough to reach a flashing point, once this occurs the nitrogen flashes and then expels the Iodine in that purple-ish brown haze. To visualize this it is like pushing 4 tennis balls into a rubber doughnut that can only hold 3. As you pressure the 4th in, all of them reluctantly stick together, but if you bump the dough nut ( electrons?) it will just want to expel the balls in any manner it can. Nitrogen itself is extremely volatile because it does not like to be cramped and reacts to anything that wants to compress it. I'm sure in a low gravity environment it behaves a bit differently than it does here on earth where barometric pressures and varying temperatures shove the molecules around more than it likes to be.

[@freds4703]

Once while I was in college in the 1960s, I noticed that cars were crackling as they drove up one of the main streets where I lived. I investigated and found traces of purple and brown iodine. Same on another main street. Someone had mixed a a big batch of ingredients and dribbled it out of a car as they drove. When it dried, NI3 all over the place. It was not me. Nice photography here.

[@jiwonlee6217]

I love this video

[@ciarangodfrey297]

On a scale of 0-1, how many hands would you have left if you slapped it?

[@MichelPASTOR]

+Ciaran Godfrey Less than many. Or many more.

[@MuadDib1402]

Cool. Now do Azidoazide Azide! :D

[@ChiralSymmetry]

How about eliminating the possibility that the flash of light is related to the filter-paper? Just repeat the experiment a few times on different surfaces: bare metal, bare ceramic tile, maybe a wire mesh, or a blob hanging off of a wire or glass rod? Also, might be interesting to try the experiment in a vacuum? Of course, rather tricky to do. But no-flash in a vacuum would mean the flash might be due to super-heated surrounding air, or due to super-heating and/or combustion of dust/contamination/substrate-surface. I would be interested to know if there is a flash on a ceramic tile in vacuum.

[@michael636336]

Excellent suggestions!

[@ThePoptartster]

Iodine gas can't be healthy! It's lovely though!

[@ben00000100]

Yes you have to do this in a ventilated space, typically a fume cupboard. As with anything that isn't air, breathing it in isn't great haha

[@ThePoptartster]

ben00000100 Good point, and thanks for mentioning a 'fume cupboard.' I never heard of one before, but it is a thing. Thx

[@ben00000100]

+ThePoptartster yeah they're in any lab you'd go to, we used it in sixth form when we made a small(ish) Christmas tree out of this stuff haha

[@michael636336]

@@ThePoptartster purple haze--- Jimi Hendrix

[@peterkrahulik2417]

Amazing chemistry. As for the flash explanation, I like commenters below who blame the sonoluminiscence. As the sound wave propagates from the solid crystals into the air it has to slow down pretty much. High speed camera along with several microphones and correct computation may easily confirm, or rule out this explanation.

[@HEAellasos]

Mosquito repellent ultra pro max

[@BassBass013]

As a chemistry major doing research in the field of physical chemistry, I have been discussing the currently unexplained phenomenon of sonar-luminescence. To the best of experimental knowledge that I've looked into, sonar-luminescence occurs when a sound wave of great frequency is concentrated in a very small area and, as if to relieve some kind of hindrance or strain, it rapidly emits a burst of photons that can be observed by high-speed cameras and other instrumentation. This coming from an undergrad's perspective, perhaps the flash you experienced was sonar-luminescence (or some other similar phenomenon)? I'm presently working on my research and I'll let you guys know if I find out anything else interesting that may be relevant.

[@kennyp172172]

Beirut had similar cloud color from the exp!osion today at there port. Hope everyones OK!

[@Lucius_Chiaraviglio]

Bond strain is not the only reason that nitrogen triodide is explosively unstable -- iodoform is isoelectronic to it with a carbon replacing the nitrogen and a hydrogen rougly where the nitrogen lone pair would be, but while it is unstable, it does not explode. Looking at the other parts of the molecule, if you replace the iodine with another halogen to get nitrogen tribromide or nitrogen trichloride, these are also explosively unstable, even though those halogens are considerably smaller than iodine -- only nitrogen trifluoride is stable. What is going on is that the dinitrogen molecule is extremely stable, having a very strong triple bond, while the bonds of nitrogen to halogens other than fluorine are very weak. So given a slight disturbance to get 2 atoms of nitrogen to come into contact, they will combine with each other and eject everything else. Similar properties are notable in several other compounds of nitrogen that can easily decompose to liberate dinitrogen, from diazo compounds to sodium azide (as used in automotive airbags). To determine what the light flash is when nitrogen triodide explodes, you would need to get a spectrum. If it is approximately a black body spectrum, it is incandescence from simple release of heat; but if it consists of discrete spectral lines, then it is chemiluminescence from electrons settling from excited states into their ground states, as also found when dinitrogen is broken into atoms with an electric arc and then the atoms recombine with visible emission of light.

[@arnoldmuller1703]

When two radicals like I (or even N) combine to a closed shell dimer, the molecule ends up usually in an electronically excited state. Possibly those decaying under hv release. In case of I2 even spin orbit coupling could be involved allowing for triplet harvesting.

[@leeharrison2722]

The light you see is directly emitted by the excited electrons of the iodine atoms as the bonds to the nitrogen are broken. Outer shell electrons are in excited states, and radiate as they relax. (There's possibly some from the nitrogen atoms too, but they are rearranging into N2 and much of their energy goes into rotational-vibrational energy of the diatomic molecule that will radiate at wavelengths we cannot see).

[@bwub1]

There are quite a lot of colours in the light from the explosion, which suggests that there is some fluorescence process going on, rather than just thermal black body radiation. You get very high energy phonons in explosive materials, so it could be that there is enough energy to excite electrons in either the NI3 crystals or in the evolved I2. The fluorescence lifetimes of both should only be on the order of picoseconds, so it could be either. The way to test of course could be to take a UV-Vis spectrum of the flash and compare it to the spectra of the NI3 and I2, but I don't know if NI3 is stable enough to do that.

[@kevinedwards7079]

Sir this is top grade presentation well done

[@dkimballgrant]

Your explanation to me seems the most logical one. From what we know about energy it makes sense especially at the speeds energy is being released.

[@TheMrbumpas]

Now I know why my pharmacist looks at me sideways whenever I want to buy iodine.

[@LilyBlossom1337]

Since it's stable when wet, would you be able to lightly mist the dry, ready-to-explode crystals it with ammonia to re-stabilize it, or would that set it off?

[@MadScientist267]

Pretty sure this is a "keep wet" situation... If a mosquito can set it off, surely tiny droplets can as well. One thing he didn't mention is that sometimes the stuff will go off on its own just sitting there... Nailed just right by a stray alpha particle (known to be able to set it off) or the like... If a helium nucleus can do it, pretty much anything can

[@Mwwwwwwwwe]

Correction ...nitro is actually a secondary...only confinement and heat or sudden shock...or sudden heat...or prolonged water contamination will make it go DDT...otherwise it just burns like fireworks

[@victorunbea8451]

Unfortunately, no mosquitoes were hurt during the making of this video.

[@murrayjorgensen861]

With a couple of fellow students I mixed up some ni3 in lunch hour in a school lab. After a few bangs we realized that the lunch hour was nearly over and another class would come in. We wondered how we could clean up the remaining ni3. I suggested that as iodine dissolves in alcohol maybe ni3 did. So we soaked some rags in alcohol and mopped the stuff up. Remarkably 1 it did dissolve, 2 it didn't explode, 3 the lab didn't burn down.

[@marusholilac]

I was an 11th grade chemistry lab assistant, when I was in 12th grade in 1962. On lecture days with no lab work I would get into mischief. I made this explosive, put drops of the liquid under seat legs, and when dry, when someone sat down, it exploded. The teacher was upset when I washed the beaker in the sink and some of the residue remained. Life was cheap then. We coated our coins with mercury, had dashboards made of pig iron, used lead for toothpaste tubes.

[@rtqii]

I had a chemistry book from the 1920's that had a section on this. They recommended drying the material on rectangles of cardboard and using the treated cardboard as rodent traps.

[@belladonnaRoot]

I'd be interested to see if the flash was caused by something other than the nitrogen triiodide itself. The substrate that the nitrogen triiodide is formed on could possibly cause the flash. Alternatively, the gasses in the atmosphere around it could cause flashes either by secondary reactions or by turning into plasma momentarily. I'd suggest forming it on a non-reactive plate, such as a metal or ceramic, and then exploding it in a vacuum. Yay for reducing variables! (If you do proceed with the vacuum idea, make sure the vacuum container is large enough; you don't want the vacuum container to explode because it has too much internal pressure.)

[@rowanmarlow7402]

Back in the 70's in my home town there was a group of rogue teenage chemists who played with the stuff. Their chemistry teacher taught them how. There were a few incidents, where it was painted on lockers enough to the point where it knocked the lockers off the wall, and another incident where a small terrier made the mistake of peeing on a can of the dried stuff (he was physically ok, but had some dog ptsd and a purple stomach). The rogue chemists refined it to the point where even they got nervous and decided to stop messing around and dumped the refined version in the middle of nowhere on a boulder. They wanted to watch it explode but it never went off and they were too scared to get close enough to set it off. They came back the next day and the boulder was gone.

[@mishx62]

the heat explanation makes sense to me, it's quite a lot of energy just judging from what we see here. I do have a couple ideas as to how to investigate farther: a. try to get a thermometer that peaks (shows the hottest point there was, and not the right now) and if such a thing doesn't exist, try to put this on a heat sensitive material, check how hot it is before the explosion 5 seconds after the explosion, 10 sec, 15 sec, etc. and try to calculate the the heat of the reaction using that and knowledge that you at the royal institution have and I don't, because i'm not a chemist, what was the heat level of the explosion. b. if more visual frames will help you, maybe contact and to a collaboration with the slow mo guys, they can probably crank out more frames than what we have here, that will both be a good video, increase exposure to your channel, and give you many more frames to work with e.g. kzbin.info/www/bejne/sKSaqWR-qpdsjcU

[@tomnekuda3818]

As an old chem teacher I can tell you exactly what causes the explosion........it's magic!

[@colinmakin9677]

We used to make this in the lab (secretly) when I was at school. On one occasion we sprinkled some on the floor outside the staff room and took great pleasure listening to the snap, crackle and pop as teachers came out the room. And you can just imagine what we did when we got hold of gunpowder. The teachers were safe, but we were not. Luckily no permanent injuries. Boys will be boys.

[@jonathanday6692]

Sounds an easy problem. Energy must be conserved, total energy in + total energy at start = total energy out + total energy left. You can determine the energy of the light by calculating the sum of (frequency x brightness) for all frequencies. A simple spectrometer would do the trick. However, you can actually now take a huge shortcut. The spectrum is a fingerprint of all the molecules present. Molecules, electrons and nuclei must be in specific states and those states alone. So the frequencies absorbed or emitted are also unique. Since there are three iodine atoms attached to a nitrogen that must attach to another nitrogen, so you've a bond that can break that might emit light or three different molecules that might absorb a frequency and re-emit it as light. Those are the only options. The frequency would tell you. Given there are so few options, and the lines can be calculated, you could use four diffraction grids and some broad frequency film. You don't need high-speed capture, you're collecting photons only.

[@ekarjernej]

About this flash, seen on the camera... For start, you should try to ignite NI3 in pure argon atmosphere. Maybe nitrogen atmosphere would be sufficient too, but in that case you should put NI3 somewhere higher in the tank of N2 atmosphere, as it is lighter than air. This would show if flash is connected with presence of oxygen (there are potential reactions between O2 and nitrogen/iodine from NI3) or not and it would be a good start for further research. :) Anyway, there is always this classical explanation with excitation of electrons in atoms, produce in explosion. (You must know, that N2 and I2 moleculs form sufficient time after explosion, first we have single atoms; yes, this time is short, but also is the flash.) While there is a lot of energy released when NI3 explodes, some of this energy can be transferred to cause electrons from lower orbitals to excite to higher orbitals. Then, as they return to their original orbitals, relaxation of this electrons occurs. If energy differences between this levels are suitable, EM waves with frequencies/wave lengths from the visual part of spectrum will form. As this this energy levels are characteristic for every atom, you could even analyse spectrum and see for which atom corresponds, but this is more a wish than reality, as flash is too fast to get any real spectroscopic analysis done. But this is general explanation for all kinds of light emission, so it would be still interesting to check this thing with presence of oxygen. :)

[@paulkramer4176]

I remember well making this substance when in college.. It is so easy to make, and it is quite stable as long as wet. And it is quite difficult to make much of the dry explosive as it detonates without any need to touch it once it is dry enough. As the edges of a lump as big as a pea dry, they will explode so I doubt you could make much more than a teaspoon full that would explode all at once. In Chem lab, a couple of us made paper airplanes with the stuff dried on the front of the plane, then flew them out the window. A few of them actually blew up upon impact. I remember almost getting expelled from my dorm at UCB, because I dropped a few teaspoons full of it in one of the elevators. People walked in and tracked the stuff all over, tiny explosions on their feet every few yards.. It makes nice purple stains all over when it explodes, (especially on linoleum or other porous substances) I went to the elevator later that night and wiped the floor with some ammonia and all the stains disappeared. That was about 55 years ago.

[@michael636336]

Chech out the Energy levels of the spectrum on elemental iodine. Film the decomposition reaction though a small slit. Let the path of the emitted light pass through the slit and then through a prism. Does the light spectrum fall into bands, or is it a continuous spectrum?

[@Baurophon]

It's a detonation flash, as occurs in every detonation. The pressure wave travels through the substance. Due to immense heat and pressure, it gets ionised and emmits light.

[@bkm83442]

Flash might be caused by sonoluminescence, brought about by the rapid acoustic compression along the shock wave front. It would only exist as long as it took for the wave front to pass, which explains why it would appear and dissipate so quickly.

[@mindzx]

How did you get the Nitrogen Triiodide on the table without it detonating while preparing the setup for filming, besides really carefully?

[@ZekeTheFur]

i commented this exact thing on another video about nitrogen triiodide, but... toddlers when mom says "no":

[@pcfreak1992]

So what would happen if you would pour a drop of water/alcohol on it? Would it explode or make the explosive stable again?

[@dbeierl]

I'm pretty sure it would go off before it had a chance to get wet. It goes off it you give it a dirty look.

[@张晟铭-w9l]

Anyone here after Beirut explosion?

[@russelldicken9930]

Looks like an interesting target for attosecond pulses to determine the electron positions

[@mineown1861]

Ooh the possibilities . Protect the jam at a picnic with landmines for wasps .

[@alanpotterton4380]

In chemistry, we learned that an atom can release energy in the form of a photon when an electron is in an excited state and falls back down to its original position, and each atom/molecule releases different photons depending on how much energy is released from the "falling" electrons, my best guess would be that the reaction released enough energy to excite the electrons of the NI3 as well as the surrounding air and possibly the paper, producing the flashes. I think the easiest way to test this theory would be to set off a reaction in a dark room and use a spectrometer to measure the wavelength of the photon, assuming the spectrometer can measure the small amount of photons in such a short duration.

[@MitroBurner]

+Alan Potterton You should be able to measure the spectrum from the video images.

[@NZ-fo8tp]

if its so unstable, how do you manage to safely produce it and collect it on the plate?

[@LeslieHelwig-py3cv]

Tried this once a couple of decades before. Putting nitrogentrioxide in solution and let it dry overnight and looked what happens when the cleaning personal stumbled about the remnants. Really small explosions but large dots on the floor. I was careful, obviously.

[@michaelheath3062]

I had a teacher who told us about "something you mix with ammonia" and using it for pranks on fellow classmates in college. It was 15 years later when I learned that that "something" was iodine

[@williamogilvie6909]

I first read about Nitrogen triIodide in high school in a chemistry book. I made some in the prep room of the chemistry lab while the teacher was out. When he came back he saw the filter paper on top of a breaker and said "I know what that is". When I got to university I knew when to avoid a sraircase.

[@tarkusnj3]

I made that back in the late 60's. You can make a "paint" out of it and paint doorknobs so when someone grabs the doorknob to enter, the result is a small explosion and the person has their hand colored purple. I told my chemistry lab class at Rutgers University in '71 how to make the explosive crystals and the next week when we had lab again, my professor got on my case because when I had left lab, others were making the explosive. I told my professor I told them how to make it but I am am not responsible for their actions...

[@HisameArtwork]

Awesome vid , thanks for sharing with us. :D

[@wannabegeek2840]

Its not NI3 pure.. it is existing as an unstable ammoniate i.e. NI3.NH3.. It explodes with noise because when it is struck liberating the vapours of iodine. The instability is due to large size of iodine resulting in greater bond length of the molecule.

[@alekxsander]

Hello buddy, could you tell me the name of the song used at the end of the video? I found it very fun, thank you!

[@Engineer__MD]

We called it ammonium triiodide but I'm sure it's the same stuff. In high school we used to love to soak a paper towel in the liquid that still had the solvent. Stick it in a water fountain at the end of the day. By morning the solvent evaporated and you had the full contact explosive that would just a good vibration would set it off. Somebody would come in take a drink of water. Pow. Wasn't all that loud but it was kind of surprising and it did leave the iodine stain on the floor along with bits and pieces of paper towel. I did find out about 35 years later when I met again my old assistant principal. 35 years later from just mentioning my last name, he asked me where I went to high school. Tells you how things in public school have changed. They were pretty sure it was me and my best friend doing this. And some other pranks that took a bit of science. But they made no real effort to do anything about it. They didn't want to mess up some kids future. Nowadays they would have had the ATF out looking for us. My friend did get in a little bit of trouble for some butyric acid. But I think they decided the punishment of having to clean up one of the worst smelling substances that can be easily made was enough.

[@AtlasReburdened]

it would be very interesting to try synthesizing this on a conductive plate and detonating it below a second conductive plate to measure the voltage between the two during the reaction. this might be a way to test if some sort of charge shuffling between the iodine gas and the reacting/unreacted portions of the triiodine is responsible for the flashes. Im by no means a chemist, but ive dealt with a whole lot of high voltage and the propagation of those flashes looks awfully similar to a high voltage seeking its ground through a material that becomes conductive as it combusts. or perhaps dried in a long strip with parallel conductive contacts along the length, spaced such that the distance between then is equal or shorter than the length of the flash tracks seen in the high fps video. measuring the voltage on each electrode during reaction should yield a better picture of whats happening with that charge. especially so if the electrodes were suspended in a manner such that they touch only the top of the nitrogen triiodide and lose contact with the substrate upon reaction. thin enough wires could probably be beneficially forced away by the reaction to achieve this. you know, food for thought.

[@EclipseAtDusk]

Yeah, the light is simply energy being generated by the reaction - not all of the energy being generated by the reaction is going into turning the compound into a different form - some is likely being let off as light and heat, as tends to happen with lots of chemical reactions.

[@MitroBurner]

I imagine that there are many crystals of NI3 formed in the drying phase, and so, besides tribuluminescense, it could be any variety of mechanoluminescence - which would occur if a single molecure of NI3 within each crystal violently destructs, creating many smaller crystals ripping electrons from one newly formed facet to another...