Why does wood turn black when it's in contact with fire, but your skin doesn't turn black?

Question

NO, I am not burning myself or other things to come up with this question. I'm just wondering...

Answer 1

Your skin is filled with nerves and blood vessels. The redness is the colour of these trying to heal. In a first degree burn you get a lot of redness and swelling to just the outer layer of skin, and is fast in healing.

A second degree burn is when the outer and next layer of skin is damaged. It causes more intense redness, swelling and blisters. This takes a little longer to heal.

Finally, third degree burns not only damage the skin layers but may have damaged other tissues like your muscles. This is when you would see the blackening of the skin (sometime it can be white). This means the nerves are damaged beyond healing and are dead (skin grafts are needed at this point).

Wood does not have all the nerves and vessels like a human does to help protect it, so it turns black long before a finger would.

Answer 2

Skin will turn black when exposed to fire undeer the right conditions. The black color comes from soot which is made mostly of carbon. You will also notice that if you run a flame along the edge of glass you will see it turn black as well, but once cool the black coloring can usually be wiped off with your finger.

Answer 3

It sure does - third degree burns are black.

The back colour comes from gas compounds that are created by the burning process. Some of them are mixed with the air, some coat objects nearby, like the firewood itself.

Answer 4

It will if it burns long enough.
Don't try this at home kids!