What's That Stuff

Sun, 2017-01-22 21:04 - Zhigang Suo

A few years ago I bought a Chinese book titled 你身边的化学. The book contains articles about chemistry in everyday life. The authors collected these articles from magazines and websites, and translated them into Chinese. In particular, the authors mentioned a column, called “What’s That Stuff”, in Chemical & Engineering News.

A Google search gives a page, which lists titles of the articles in the section “What’s That Stuff” published from August 1998 to October 2010. Unfortunately, each link does not direct to an article. You have to google search for the article. For example, here is the article on adhesive tape. I also find another page on What’s That Stuff. At the bottom of the page, there is a form that links to articles published between 2004 and 2016.

In the end I created a google doc of What’s That Stuff. I linked each entry to the article. If you find an official list of these articles, please leave a comment below.

Many articles in “What’s That Stuff” contain information found in Wikipedia. Google translate can convert English to any language you like. I checked some Chinese translations. They are readable. The information online lets you learn almost anything. One just has to ask questions. The C&EN section “What’s that Stuff” asks questions for you.

I paste the links below:

Adhesive Tape
Aircraft Deicers
Amber
Artificial Snow
Artificial Sweeteners
Asphalt

Atomic Clock
Baseballs
Beer

Beer, gluten-reduced

Blue Jeans

Body Armor
Bowling Balls
Bug Sprays
Catnip
Cement
Champagne

Champagne, how to preserve fizzle
Cheese Whiz
Chewing Gum
Chicken Eggs
Chili peppers
Chocolate
Citronella Oil
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