Jess, Natalie, and Bry

*To test if iron, (the steel wool) would burn better in an oxygen rich environment, we used potassium chlorate powder to separate oxygen into a test tube. *We heated the powder in a test tube over the Bunsen burner, and when it decomposes it releases the oxygen. *We connected it by a orange hose to another test tube in a deep tray. *When the oxygen releases you can see the bubbles, and when the tube empties of water we removed it and add a stopper. *It is important to make sure that there is no air in the tube before putting in the hose.

 *Each trial took about two minutes for the potassium chlorate to heat up to the point it would release oxygen and empty the test tube.  *Formula for potassium chlorate is KCIO 3

 *The hypothesis was that with a more oxygen rich environment the steel wool would automatically catch fire when we dropped it into the oxygen filled test tube.  *The hypothesis was proved correct; although we expected a larger flame than what we got, the steel would burn significantly more when placed in the oxygen filled test tube.  *To take this further, we would test other metals to see if the results would be similar.