I think a solid 'dissolved' in another solid is an alloy, e.g. steel (Fe
and C), brass (Zn and Cu) tho' they have to be melted first. BTW
something funny happens with ethanol and water since they can't
ultimately be separated by distillation (let alone gravity fields)
because of the formation of an azeotrope
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azeotrope>.
Robert C
On 7/8/12 6:59 PM, Arlo Barnes wrote:
The innocence of many of your questions as posed should be more
overtly valued... many of us are busy asking (quietly) similar or
related questions.
Amen!
A thing to think about re: mixing of alcohol and water is that both
are polar molecules, and thus mutually attracted, which no doubt helps
keep them from separating. However, since they are also equally
attracted to themselves, they could conceivably settle out were it not
for the aforementioned phenomena such as convection, et cetera. A
solution however (and I think no distinction is made about the states
of the materials [for example, the gas CO2 can dissolve in water to
form carbonic acid, the burning sensation felt when consuming
carbonated drinks], although it is hard to imagine a solid dissolving
in a solid) would need to be electrolytically separated, is my
understanding of the difference in definitions. The reason for this
is, taking the example of salt in water, is that the salt separates
into it's ionic components (for reasons unknown to me pending further
reading) which then would repel each other...or only the like-charged
ones would. Hm, I guess that too is pending further reading.
-Arlo James Barnes
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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
