Ok...so this a pretty weird question because I'm not an engineer of any type (I'm actually a scientific communicator), but I thought this would be a good place to cure my curiosity about something.
I recently ran across two products that are really interesting to me and am curious about what makes them work. I'm not sure if they both use the same material, but essentially they both consist of some sort of liquid that is non-toxic that can be heated up and that stays hot for hours. What could this be?
The first one is called Snugglesafe and is warmer for pets:
http://www.amazon.com/Pet-Supply-Imports-SnuggleSafe-Heating/dp/B00008AJH9It says it's a non-electrical plate-size pad that provides up to 12 hours of safe, soothing warmth and you place it in your microwave to heat it up. The company is calling it thermapol but i think they made that word up.
The second thing is something called Coffee Joulies, which are little metal beans filled with a liquid that keep your coffee or tea hot for 3 hours. Here's how it's described: They absorb excess thermal energy when the coffee is initially poured too hot to drink, cooling your coffee down to a drinkable temperature three times faster. Once your coffee reaches the right temperature the beans release that stored thermal energy back into the coffee, keeping it in the optimal temperature range twice as long.
What type of chemicals would do this? Thanks, hopefully this is a fun question.
Tea
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Topic: Odd question--should have been a chem eng. major (Read 5869 times)