How do the chemicals in glow sticks work?

Question

I mean, you just bend the glow stick and it lights up. How does it work?

Answer 1

You bend it and it snaps!

http://chemistry.about.com/library/weekly/aa040902a.htm


Lightsticks or glowsticks are used by trick-or-treaters, divers, campers, and for decoration and fun! A lightstick is a plastic tube with a glass vial inside of it. In order to activate a lightstick, you bend the plastic stick, which breaks the glass vial. This allows the chemicals that were inside the glass to mix with the chemicals in the plastic tube. Once these substances contact each other, a reaction starts taking place. The reaction releases light, causing the stick to glow!

A Chemical Reaction Releases Energy
One form of energy is light. Some chemical reactions release energy; the chemical reaction in a lightstick releases energy in the form of light. The light produced by this chemical reaction is called chemiluminescence.

Although the light-producing reaction is not caused by heat and may not produce heat, the rate at which it occurs is affected by temperature. If you place a lightstick in a cold environment (like a freezer), then the chemical reaction will slow down. Less light will be released while the lightstick is cold, but the stick will last much longer. On the other hand, if you immerse a lightstick in hot water, the chemical reaction will speed up. The stick will glow much more brightly, but will wear out faster too.

What's Involved?
There are three components of a lightstick. There need to be two chemicals that interact to release energy and also a fluorescent dye to accept this energy and convert it into light. Although there is more than one recipe for a lightstick, a common commercial lightstick uses a solution of hydrogen peroxide that is kept separate from a solution of a phenyl oxalate ester together with a fluorescent dye. The color of the fluorescent dye is what determines the resulting color of the lightstick when the chemical solutions are mixed. The basic premise of the reaction is that the reaction between the two chemicals releases enough energy to excite the electrons in the fluorescent dye. This causes the electrons to jump to a higher energy level and then fall back down and release light.

Specifically, the chemical reaction works like this: The hydrogen peroxide oxidizes the phenyl oxalate ester, to form phenol and an unstable peroxyacid ester. The unstable peroxyacid ester decomposes, resulting in phenol and a cyclic peroxy compound. The cyclic peroxy compound decomposes to carbon dioxide. This decomposition reaction releases the energy that excites the
dye.

Answer 2

The chemicals used to create this reaction in glow sticks are usually hydrogen peroxide and a mixture of phenyl oxalate ester and the fluorescent dye that gives the glow stick its color. The hydrogen peroxide is contained in a small glass tube that floats within the mixture inside the plastic glow stick. This is why you must bend a glow stick to make it start glowing. When the stick bends, the glass vial breaks, the hydrogen peroxide is released, the chemical reaction begins and you get the distinctive glow.

Answer 3

A lightstick is a plastic tube with a glass vial inside of it. In order to activate a lightstick, you bend the plastic stick, which breaks the glass vial. This allows the chemicals that were inside the glass to mix with the chemicals in the plastic tube. Once these substances contact each other, a reaction starts taking place. The reaction releases light, causing the stick to glow

Answer 4

As above, its a chemical reaction between substances which cause an excitation of the valence electrons which absorb energy to jump to a higher energy level, and almost instantaneously return to their resting state, emitting energy as a photon - fluorescence.

ATP is adenosine triphospate. It is composed of a nitrogenous base, adenine, bound to a pentose sugar and has a "tail" of three phospates, the last one of them being highly unstable, and easily lost with the release of energy. It does not fluoresce unless its activity increase the excitement of an electron of a compound it phosphorylates. Tryptophan binding with ATP will fluoresce and is commonly used as a tool to understand ATP binding and hydrolysis. It is the tryptophan that glows, not the ATP.
Green Fluorescent Protein (jelly fish) is activated by calcium cations, emitting a green fluorescence.

Answer 5

Not quite sure, but i know theirs a glass tube down the middle that when you bend them the glass breaks and the chemicals in the tube react and glow!

Answer 6

ATP is the "cool" light, or chemical light, the stuff that makes glow worms glow and fireflies blink.

The ATP is
Adenosine
Tri-
Phosphate

Answer 7

sorry this may not be an answer, but I have always wondered that as well, they usually well some of them have this aluminouse jell inside them, maybe its got something to do with reflection. man the day I found out how they make that, in the cheapest possible way, id be rolling in bare cash LOL

Answer 8

Alan K: Are you sure about ATP? Isn't ATP one of the steps in the Kreb's cycle?