Fizzics Question, seriously...

Ok... most everyone (lol, I hope) knows that a coke/whatever fizzes big time when you pour it quickly into a glass. But I've noticed that when some things are in the glass first, fizzing is minimal.

One thing is peppermint oil, which we use fairly often (it helps with queasiness that is sometimes brought on by a long-lasting headache, weather-related or otherwise). Another thing is hard liquor.

I understand why the peppermint oil might snuff the fizziness, because it more-or-less floats on the surface and (I assume) forms a seal that stops bubbles from escaping.

But alcohol doesn't float, it mixes with the coke/whatever. So why does it also quench the fizziness?

Several destabilising effects can break foam down. Gravitation causes drainage of liquid to the foam base, osmotic pressure causes drainage from the lamellas to the Plateau borders due to internal concentration differences in the foam, and Laplace pressure causes diffusion of gas from small to large bubbles due to pressure difference.
A wide variety of substances can affect these factors. With alcohol, it's mostly viscosity reduction & dilution of both dissolved CO2 & the foaming substances in the soda. Because of this, I think you'll find that the effect is quite different between flavored sodas & club soda.
I can't say about peppermint oil, as I have no experience with it.


BTW: Candied ginger is another excellent natural anti-nauseant.

Interesting. Thanks.

Ginger does work well for nausea (we usually have capsules on hand, sweetie takes them). Never tried the candied stuff, but the capsules burn a wee bit with my ulcers.

With ulcers, I'm surprised you can tolerate alcohol...I couldn't.
My ulcers went away when I started taking Zantac, which is now sold over the counter, at least in this country.
Have you tried it?

I have other issues with acid blockers. I did use Prilosec when they were 10mg, but can't tolerate the newer 20mg ones.

Plain old calcium carbonate works better than anything for me.

Those of you with ulcers get checked for pylori
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicobacter_pylori
Google for more.

ground nutmeg ...
my dad used this ... about 1/8-1/4 teaspoon .
works for me .

Yeah this seems like a surface tension issue.

-Adam O.

I looked at this many years ago, because a friend's glass would go flat afer he drank out of it. Oily skin was the answer.

Wow! That's quite an oily skin trouble if mere upper lip contact can flatten beer!
Soultion: Mustache.

You do realize that alkaline antacids actually worsen the problem, by causing the stomach to make ever greater amounts of acid?
I take calcium carbonate myself, but only as a calcium supplement & never on a daily basis.
Nowdays, the only time I have stomach issues is when I take too many NSAID painkillers.

I do what works, and it's worse without the calcium. Sorry.

i knew an old boy that had ulcers ... he constantly chewed tobacco (copenhagen) and consumed ethanol .
he ate tums and sodium bicarbonate like it was going out of style .
he developed some serious problems with kidney/bladder stones .
this was before the advent of ultrasonic pulverization .
yep , only two ways to get rid of them .
after three times you think he would listen to his doc ... nope .

I try to stay away from commercial antacids (tums, etc.) because most contain aluminum.

I don't take large quantities of calcium anyway. Mostly when there's a long period between meals or at bedtime, and occasionally with some foods or drinks. Some days I don't take any.

From what I understand, calcium carbonate is less absorbed by the body than other types, so hopefully there's a minimal danger of stones.

and you know this...how?..

and speaking of yet another type/area of "fizzics" ...
i just built the first batch of my (in)famous chili of the fall/winter seasons .
i can assure you that those laws involved have not changed .

and you know this...how?..

It's pretty obvious soon after ya stop takin' em. Been there.

@Larry: Man I love a good bowl of chili, just can't do spicy stuff too close together anymore. Makes it more of a treat when I can though.

As to why it fizzes in the first place, as the liquid fills in the glass, you might notice on close inspection that it traps some bubbles on the surface. Now, if the surface were smooth and clean, and the liquid level rises without splashing, it should wet the surface evenly. But because it isn't (ripples in the glass, hard water deposits, yesterday's coffee stains, etc.), bubbles get trapped, even microscopic bubbles you wouldn't notice.

Anywhere there's an air-liquid interface, dissolved gas exchanges with that space. If there's more gas in the liquid than whatever pressure the thing is at, that gas will seep out and fill the bubble. Pretty soon the bubble expands, breaks off, floats up to the top (and breaks, making one more of a million fizzes), leaving a nub of gas still stuck to whatever it started as, allowing the process to continue.

Very clean containers, with pure water, heated with a microwave, often superheat as the surface doesn't allow a rolling boil to take off. The addition of a surface with trapped bubbles (such as a wooden stir stick) can cause the water to erupt as it suddenly flashes to steam.

As to the foam, dissolved materials tend to change the surface tension, or enhance various properties of the liquid. You can imagine the sugar molecules in a coke kind of sticking together, enhancing the foaminess of the bubbles. Moreso the proteins in a wheat beer, which both make it cloudy and strengthen the head.

And finally, alcohol tends to break the foam because it weakens surface tension and, I suppose to some extent, lubricates the interface between molecules. Pour a coke, then add rum and the foam just blows away.

curious point, if higher pressure raises boiling point, does that also mean that the freezing point will be a higher temp at said higher pressure?.. one would assume so, yet a bottle of carbonated water left in the freezer remains liquid until the pressure is released.. is that something to do with Carbonic acid or..?

And i assume the effect should be reversed having a liquid stored in a low pressure, yet it seems the end result would be the same as high pressure once exposed to atmospheric..

Dissolved gasses typically lose solubility in solids, so the pressure rises dramatically as it becomes frozen. It isn't necessary for the freezing point to change very much. It is necessary, because the release of gas performs work, and if it's working against a higher pressure, say because you pressurized the bottle already, or because the bottle is very stiff, a steel bomb for instance, and has no room for expansion, then it certainly should be more reluctant to freeze.

Exactly how much the melting point is depressed depends on the chemistry (if it's forming carbonic acid or what). Most likely there are tables out there, somewhere, of empirical data. Most likely they aren't easy to find.