Advanced Tinkering - 2025-02-15
In today's video, we visit a laboratory that works with the most reactive element in the world – fluorine. This element is so notorious that it has drawn YouTubers like NileRed, Explosions&Fire, and MrGreenGuy from all corners of the world to Germany. I'll show you how scientists handle such a dangerous substance and reveal never-before-seen reactions between fluorine and various materials. Join my Patreon and support my projects! Your contribution means the world to me and helps bring my ideas to life. I truly appreciate your support! https://www.patreon.com/AdvancedTinkering Check out Prof. Kraus YouTube Channel:@Fluorineisgreat A huge thanks to Prof. Kraus lab for making this video possible: https://www.uni-marburg.de/de/fb15/arbeitsgruppen/anorganische_chemie/ag-kraus
appreciate for including nile red in the project. its hard for small creators to start sometimes, and im sure he appreciates this alot
@@justcamawelcome to the world of sarcasm
@@_apsis this is the third comment I’ve read where someone doesn’t understand sarcasm. 🤦♂️
Seriously nilered is a much larger creator than this guy all you need to do is look at his channel unless you are just being a troll or sarcastic
@@CodyChambers-t3p Wait, Nile Red has more subscribers? Really?
😂
I recognized that sign in the back of the fume hood:
"Not only will this kill you, it will hurt the entire time you're dying."
Seems apt.
Nah...it just retcons you out of existence.
They should put stuff like that on the outside of cigarette packaging; the same sort of warning would be great for vaccine incentives... Something along the lines of: the most common side effect of receiving this vaccine is a sore muscle in the local area around the injection site. The most common side effect of not getting this vaccine is a severe respiratory system infection that can result in hospitalization, loss of taste and smell, choking to death or drowning on the fluid buildup in your lungs or pneumonia from the illness and death from myriad other complications or permanent disability from the aftereffects of the disease!
Me 2 the only one worse? I know of is the same but Freeze Dried if you survived those others?
Phuckers! told me it was pure oxygen!
Found the sheep.
@jjj-i6d5k explain.
If I'm in that laboratory, and as soon as I hear one of my colleagues say "oops", rest assured I'm running out of there faster than the road runner.
I am glad I don’t live near Marburg.
Bass, I love you.
@@DeRico1337
Lol yup!
Fluorine, I Love You!
It appears that pressurized or high-flowrate fluorine has an adverse effect on...everything. Amazing video, and thanks for the mention!
Great minds think alike
Do you think it could ignite a rock?
yes, it definatly could....@dralanjhgi
Not on everything... it made those fires WAY better!
@@dralanjhgi If it can ignite a brick, I'm sure it can ignite a rock, as long as the rock isn't already a fluorine compound
Ty to Patrick for sacrificing his fume hood for us. May his research bring him eternal glory, and his career be free of mishaps.
I remember reading a quote that went roughly like "many an ambitious chemist's life has been cut short once they embark upon the study of fluorine halides"
This sounds so much like Derek Lowe's "Things I Won't Work With"
When flourine compounds were discovered, it took 70 years before fluorine was isolated and three chemists died.
@@darylcheshire1618 That must mean the three chemists lived very long lives.
There is no such thing as an old fluorochemist!
The scientists that isolated fluorine were known as the Fluorine Martyrs.
Too bad they never got to enjoy their nickname.
Nilered didn't go there to make a video... he went to learn how to safely(ish) handle those compounds for a future project.
Yep..... I really hope he survives the project. XD
Gotcha, best defence against a flourine accident is running shoes.
😁😄🤣🤣😂😅
wasn't that specifically ClF3?
When I used to drive white phos round the firefighting instructions we were given was to discharge the fire extinguisher over your shoulder while you run the other way.
Make sure, you are running against wind or atleast 90 degree angle
Ahhhh. That's a runaway reaction, right?
3:24 NileRed entering the flouring lab, grinning like a maniac. Danger level just increased to 'Unfathomable'
Nigel's nonchalant laughter in the presence of obscene danger is so endearing lol
I was about to look for another video to watch but then he said Nile, Yep I'll keep watching been. subscribed to him for awhile love his videos
i am a chemistry student at Uni Marburg and it is so nice to see that you all went to Prof.Kraus´ lab and made a video about fluorine. The research there is highly interesting and inspiring. Love your channel and so cool that you did one month internship
Awesome! I’m glad you liked the video! Yes, Prof. Kraus‘ lab does a lot of interesting research.
I INSTANTLY thought of the University of Marburg and high energy chemistry lol
Wait, is professor Klaus, one of the few men who can safely work with Fluorine… named Florian? That’s some serious nominative determinism!
Fluorian.
My supervisors last name is Florian, lol. I work at a tire manufacturing plant. 🤣🤣
I knew a Lionel Wheeler. He owned a shop that aligned wheels. True story.
My name "Björn" means "bear" in Swedish. I work in IT. No coincidence there. Because I'm good at that stuff! 😉
it always makes me smile when Chem youtubers hang out. I assume they have a mad scientist discord
I was recently injected with the isotope fluorine-18; the tech was fully garbed, and the syringe was encased in a tungsten shield.
The positron emissions over the very short half-life highlighted my tumours nicely.
Yup its insanely radioactive but very short half life. The chemical used is 5 fluoroglucose. It's used to find areas of high metabolism.
hopefully the tumors are benign, thank you for sharing!
Hope the tumors are benign, will pray for your speedy recovery! 😊
It's antimatter! Feels like Star Trek technology.
I hope you will recover.
Never too early to speak to a lawyer about securing the rights to the future X-men movie.
small creator is a really accurate description of nilered
Wow, you are sour.
@@mariemccann5895 I wouldn't immediately criticize a comment in what could be immediately understood as sarcasm for actual malice
Talking about that NileGreen wannabe ? 😂
@@mariemccann5895 Wow, you are dense
He is like 5 feet tho
I met Patrick at a fluorine congress in early January and he spoiled me that a video was coming with most chemist Youtuber in Kraus' Lab. To be honest I completely forgot about it.
Really nice video!
That’s a funny coincidence! Thank you, I’m glad you liked the video!
Wait wait wait. There's an evil chemist DISCORD?!?!?
Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! I think they could still be identified as mad rather than evil.
@@johnlucas6683 no, when experimenting with Fluorine you cross a line even mad scientists manage to toe
Nahhhhh you’re thinking of l.o.v.e.m.u.f.f.i.n
Needs to be pubicly visible
Nile Red probably runs the damn thing. He's one life tragedy away from becoming a super villain lol.
I had such a great time with you and all the other guys filming this video! I hope there is a lot more stuff like this to come in the future! ;-)
I thought you are busy building your potassium empire. :D
@@altxyz Haha I am busy with a lot of stuff actually.
Insane how the lab coat was harder to light on fire than the firemen's coat. Very interesting video, and nice cameos. Thank you!
Nomex will burn "vigorously" in an oxygen rich atmosphere - so I'm not at all surprised fluorine will do it. They really drilled into us - if you ever see O2 > 20% on the meter get OUT
That actually makes sense to me because the primary purpose of a fireman's coat is to protect you from high heat while lab coats need to react to as little as possible.
An opposite observation I had was that the lab coat kept burning after the flourine was stopped while the fireman's coat just smoked a little.
A key example of needing to use the right tools/safety for the job
@@jtosety That's actually really good reasoning. Thank you for the enlightenment!
Best molecule: FOOF
It does what it sounds like
Satan’s Kimchi.
until you discover, they got more insane and synthesized hexaoxygen difluoride FOOOOOOF. Which, funnily enough, is what your fume hood sounds like, reaching escape velocity because you heated it up to 90 K (-298F, 183C) too fast.
My man reading up on the things I won't work with blog, I like it!
Wow. NileRed has a great channel. I am glad you included him. Thanks for the informative video.
Thanks for busting some myths about fluorine. People think that putting a piece of brick into a 1 bar atmosphere of fluorine will cause it to ignite, but it really requires an initiator and a strong flow of the gaseous reactant.
I still think this was a missed opportunity not to ask another department to lend some liquid helium and finally make pictures of solid fluorine. I don't think there are any photographs of it online, only descriptions.
That’s an interesting idea. Maybe it will be possible for me to film solid fluorine at some point.
Wait, does F react with He or is it just a temperature thing?
@@KevinLyda it's a temperature thing, liquid hydrogen is colder than liquid nitrogen so it can freeze the fluorine instead of liquefy it
Oh, thank goodness, fluorine only burns bricks if there's an initiator AND a high flow. Pheew, for a minute there I thought this stuff might be dangerous.
I'm no chemist myself, but I distinctly remember my high school chemistry teacher telling us that if one were to take a lump of solid fluorine the size of a house brick (and had a way to prevent this "experiment" from ending before it began) and threw it into a tub of water, the resulting explosion would be powerful enough to level a skyscraper. What do you think of that?
Awesome video on fluorine. . Super cool collaboration. Totally amazing 👏👍👍
Thank you so much! :)
It's so hilarious that a layman will overblow the dangers of uranium when you can even hold it in your bare hands, or even lick it (unless it was a dusty sample), while he won't even have any knowledge on the dangers of fluorine gas which is so reactive it can tear electrons off from noble gases.
Yeah, uranium and thorium aren’t that bad. I’d stay away from stronger alpha emitters like radium and polonium though.
Ideally youd stay away from any radioactive material but thats easier said then done
@@Kaenguruuehhh unless you eat uranium it's basically harmless, it's mainly emitting alpha particles so unless it's inside you they're getting blocked by your skin
Anything that can rip electrons off a nobel gas is indeed terrifying.
Fluorine: the atom you get mugged by.
Making your own equipment is a time-honored tradition in experimental physics. Back in the day, we made a liquid ozone generator to do cross-section collision measurements with various upper atmospheric molecules -- including HFl, but never Fl2 itself.
I can't blame Tom.. It's his style..
I hope one of them said "Hey Tom it's your favorite color!" @17:30
Tom discovers the final boss of yellow chemistry at 17:07
Glad to see some of my favorite madmen in the same room!
Very impressed by the lab and how they manufacture the equipment they need as well.
Is it,um, symptomatic that I recognized some of them with the sound off?
I cannot believe all of my favorite science and physics YT creators were in 1 video!!! Who would've thought a little Fluorine experimentation could bring everyone together? Thank you AT and another huge TY TY TY to all my other faves for participating and all you guys taking the time to visit Germany for the production of this vid! Well done! Super important to show, if not in such a minor fraction of time to highlight all the processes required for handling and storing Fluorine. It feels a bit strange to see that and read that......Fluorine lol. Who would've known such a substance could be so "unstable"? Seriously well done and how cool it was to see you all together!! Again thank you all for the making and participating in this video!
Thank you for watching! I’m glad you liked the video!
I think everyone who worked in a lab would think that it would be super cool and scary to see some fluorine.
Good on everyone involved for all the time it takes to create this.
“No, elemental fluorine has commanded respect since well before anyone managed to isolate it, a process that took a good fifty years to work out in the 1800s. (The list of people who were blown up or poisoned while trying to do so is impressive).” Derek Lowe’s “Things I Won't Work With: Dioxygen Difluoride”
If you like this sort of think its worth tracking down a copy of John Drury Clark's book titled "Ignition....." (sorry, I cant remember the full title). Its a history of early American experiments with rocket fuels, including hydrogen-fluorine mixes. Just imagine the hydrofluoric acid exhaust plume on each launch (scary stuff).
I actually started reading that book (well, listening to the audiobook version) after it was mentioned by Curious Droid, I think. I can’t remember why I didn’t finish it, but I’ll get back to it.
The chapter titled "In search of the hypergol" made me constantly think "You did what?!?!? And lived to write about it?!"
Yup. A fascinating tale of stuff that will ignite when you think about it, burn holes through concrete and/or set lab techs on fire. Can't remember which particular substance it was where 'running shoes' were considered the most appropriate safety gear. FOOF, most likely.
The title is "Ignition!: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants", for many years legal copies were hard to find and expensive, though there were some PDFs of dubious quality floating around the internet but in 2018 it was republished, so it's now easy to get.
@@ThatGeezer It's Chlorine Trifluorine. Flourine's even more aggressive child that literally eats concrete for breakfast, lunch, dinner, midmorning tea, afternoon tea, supper and all the snacktimes in between.
Its really nice to see the small hardly known about YouTuber NileRed get some exposure.
Yes, only 8 million subscribers. 😂
So nice of you to give such a small creator like the Niel Reed guy some of your YouTube spotlight 🙏♥
1:25 OMFG YESSS MY FAVORITE LITTLE SHED CHEMIST ❤❤❤
Thank you so much to the lab and everyone that helped make this happen, it's beyond rare to get to see such things!
So exciting to see your channel take off like this. You deserve it!
Thank you so much! And thank you for being part of that journey.
Seepferdchen Schwimmabzeichen lab coat 😆
Und Discobeleuchtung im Abzug! :D
Würde das Labor plötzlich mit Flüssigen Fluor geflutet werden, er würde zumindest nicht ertrinken.
Nicht zu vergessen, der „Nett hier”-Bäbber
Florine, Florine, Florine, Floree-een! Don't burn it down just because you can.
8:20 Look at that all-star lineup. Glorious
Great choice of subject matter! Fluorine videos are just so rare on YouTube, it's like that omnipresent element who's compound that we brush our teeth morning and night, yet know almost nothing about.
I used to work in the semiconductor industry. Once, in my bay of the fab, I heard a technician screaming from outside of the clean room(!) because he was having a giant (16 gauge?...or roundabouts) "needle" [hollow nail!] jammed into his hand. Apparently, he was trying to fix a robotic arm device over an HF sink that refused to drain. He didn't drain the sink before trying to fix the robotic element or something equally forgetful. The robotic arm fell into the HF sink, splashed HF all over his hand and up his arm a ways.
HF will not hurt at first as it seeks out the calcium in your body to bond with. So, to give it something else to chew on b4 the medics arrive &/or it starts to liquify your bones, the affected area will be covered with a calcium "lotion" after a colloidal calcium compound is injected into the area. Such an injection requires a giant freaking "needle"!
😭
I'll take the giant needle over my bones liquifying, thanks.
Sounds like an absolutely terrifying experience. I love your description of giving the HF 'something to chew on'. I have to say though that in my experience, 16 gauge is nothing, I've routinely had lots of 'permanent' body piercings done at that, even sometimes being a pincushion for apprentices to practice on, haha. 4 gauge (4.1mm) is much more 'interesting', and I've had nearly 2 hundred of those done too, albeit only temporarily, they're deffo quite 'nippy'.
Jesus. Did the guy survive and retain the function in his hand? People have died from much less.
So good of you to throw the smaller creators a bone!
I only subscribed to you about a year ago, but I have to say I'm so delighted by how many more subscribers you've got. I guess you've done great with your shorts, but new viewers, do subscribe and watch the old videos too. They're amazing!
Thank you for being a subscriber! :) Unfortunately, only a few of the subscribers gained through Shorts watch the long videos. But I'm still very grateful for the many views on the Shorts and the new subscribers!
What an amazing opportunity to see an incredibly rare and dangerous chemical being demonstrated.
Thanks so much for sharing this.
Das ist ein sehr wichtiges Video 👏. Danke Patrik
The most popular chemistry YouTubers in one place. Thank you all for this great cinema!
There are some who refuse to work with it, and then there are others so insane they use it in a tri-propellant rocket engine.
Not only is Florian Kraus the most knowledgeable about Fluorine, but he's still alive! (and has the best name for someone who works with Fluorine)
13:22 "Surely if we set the brick on fire it will melt the steel"... 😅
A sentence you don’t hear very often :D
@@AdvancedTinkeringI imagine that's a phrase you only hear in a Flourine lab.
@TCOphox - 2025-02-17
The fact that a stray fingerprint on a flourine-safe metal can ignite with flourine, destroy the protective metal flouride layer, and start a metal fire, is absolutely bonkers to me and thus I finally truely understand the safety precautions taken.
@stuartgmk - 2025-02-17
👍👍
@SteveBludsworth - 2025-02-18
Look at 6min08sec in the video...
What I find funny.. Right after they explain this they show the long hair scientist run his gloves over is face pulling back is hair... That dude is a serious risk in that environment...
@Speeder84XL - 2025-02-18
This is even worse when you think about the fact that most of the grease is often not coming from the hands them self, but from the face and hair - as most people put their hands in the face and rub them thru the hair all the time. Put your face against a window or mirror and you will see, haha. Now if someone do the same with their glove covered hand, it gets on the glove too and they will leave grease on the objects they work with (not in the typical pattern of fingerprints, but there will be smudges).
Maybe the amount of grease isn't enough in most cases, but if fingerprints really are a concern, this will indeed be as well. Maybe that was the reson the pressure regulator went up in flames at 12:00...
I use to look at the phone display, it's is also a good indicator (look against the light). If I wash my hands with dish soap, I could use it for hours without leaving visible fingerprints on it - then I touch the hair and it get fingerpints all over it (unless I have taken a shower within the last 3 hours or so - washing the face and hair as well).
@recreationalplutonium - 2025-02-18
@@SteveBludsworth that's not a scienctist. it's one of the influencer idiots
@michaelf7093 - 2025-02-22
I'm a chemist. I won't touch the stuff.