Light bulbs are a big upgrade from fires and candles. Every year, homes in informal settlements burn down in Africa because of fires used for heating and lighting. So electrical light bulbs with filaments brought about a ...
Optics & Photonics
Nov 8, 2021
11
316
A team of researchers from Plex Corporation, Bruker Scientific LLC and Harvard University has found evidence of a protein inside of a meteorite. They have written a paper describing their findings and have uploaded it to ...
Sunscreen that includes zinc oxide, a common ingredient, loses much of its effectiveness and becomes toxic after two hours of exposure to ultraviolet radiation, according to a collaboration that included Oregon State University ...
Materials Science
Oct 14, 2021
3
4088
Caltech microbiologists have discovered bacteria that feed on manganese and use the metal as their source of calories. Such microbes were predicted to exist over a century ago, but none had been found or described until now.
Materials Science
Jul 15, 2020
3
5919
A team of researchers from the Instituto de Carboquímica of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) has made a remarkable step forward in the development of efficient and sustainable electronic devices. They have found ...
Nanomaterials
Jul 20, 2023
0
459
Viruses can spread not only via droplets or aerosols like the new coronavirus, but in water, too. In fact, some potentially dangerous pathogens of gastrointestinal diseases are water-borne viruses.
Bio & Medicine
Jun 3, 2021
0
954
Scientists at UC Riverside are suggesting something is missing from the typical roster of chemicals that astrobiologists use to search for life on planets around other stars—laughing gas.
Astrobiology
Oct 4, 2022
1
1045
Material scientists have developed a fast method for producing epsilon iron oxide and demonstrated its promise for next-generation communications devices. Its outstanding magnetic properties make it one of the most coveted ...
Nanophysics
Jun 28, 2021
1
1631
Most people are familiar with uranium as a fuel for nuclear power plants. And while that's the most common application, this element is also used in many other fields, such as dyes, medical devices, and weapons. Scientists ...
Materials Science
Aug 14, 2020
0
3007
Ribonucleic acids (RNAs) are single-stranded molecules that play an essential role in the cells of all living organisms. As "transcripts" of our genes, mRNAs, for example, are involved in the translation of genetic information ...
Biochemistry
Apr 24, 2023
0
1303
Redox (shorthand for reduction-oxidation reaction) describes all chemical reactions in which atoms have their oxidation number (oxidation state) changed. This can be either a simple redox process such as the oxidation of carbon to yield carbon dioxide or the reduction of carbon by hydrogen to yield methane (CH4), or it can be a complex process such as the oxidation of sugar in the human body through a series of very complex electron transfer processes.
The term redox comes from the two concepts of reduction and oxidation. It can be explained in simple terms:
Though sufficient for many purposes, these descriptions are not precisely correct. Oxidation and reduction properly refer to a change in oxidation number — the actual transfer of electrons may never occur. Thus, oxidation is better defined as an increase in oxidation number, and reduction as a decrease in oxidation number. In practice, the transfer of electrons will always cause a change in oxidation number, but there are many reactions that are classed as "redox" even though no electron transfer occurs (such as those involving covalent bonds).
Non-redox reactions, which do not involve changes in formal charge, are known as metathesis reactions.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
