What makes hydrogen peroxide foam?

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	What makes hydrogen peroxide foam?

Pooge

1-6-2008 8:22 PM

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tags:

science, peroxide, chemistry

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<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/ef5ff9ea-14f6-4947-a651-d512c850763e/6E381DCA-F613-45E2-94DD-7E0ACC3D57C2/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm" href="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm" style="font-size: 11px;">www.howstuffworks.com</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm">
						Why does hydrogen peroxide foam when you put it on a cut?</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm">Most people use it as an <STRONG>antiseptic</STRONG>. It turns out that it is not very good as an antiseptic, but it is not bad for washing cuts and scrapes and the foaming looks cool.</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm"><P>
The reason why it foams is because <A href="http://www.howstuffworks.com/blood.htm">blood</A> and <A href="http://www.howstuffworks.com/cell.htm">cells</A> contain an enzyme called <STRONG>catalase</STRONG>. Since a cut or scrape contains both blood and damaged cells, there is lots of catalase floating around. 
</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm"><P>
When the catalase comes in contact with hydrogen peroxide, it turns the hydrogen peroxide (H<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB>O<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB>) into water (H<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB>O) and oxygen gas (O<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB>). 
</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm"><STRONG>
2H<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB>O<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB> --&gt; 2H<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB>O + O<SUB><FONT size="-1">2</FONT></SUB>
</STRONG></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.howstuffworks.com/question115.htm"><P>
Catalase does this extremely efficiently -- up to <STRONG>200,000 reactions per second</STRONG>. The bubbles you see in the foam are pure oxygen bubbles being created by the catalase. Try putting a little hydrogen peroxide on a cut potato and it will do the same thing for the same reason -- catalase in the damaged potato cells reacts with the hydrogen peroxide.
</P></blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;">&nbsp;</td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/6E381DCA-F613-45E2-94DD-7E0ACC3D57C2/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content7.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>

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