Dripping Wet or Dry as a Bone?
Students explore relative humidity.Copyright Microsoft Corporation 1983-2001
Students use a sponge and water model to explore the concept of relative humidity and create a percent scale. Through this experiment, teams collect data, make calculations and draw conclusions. They gain clarification in the difference between relative and absolute humidity. They also learn real-world reasons why understanding the concept of humidity is important for engineers. A student activity worksheet is provided.
Understanding the science of humidity is important to many engineers. Environmental engineers consider the specific weather and atmospheric conditions of an area when researching air pollutant transport and concentrations. Industrial engineers find that the amount of water in the air affects how difficult or easy it is to remove pollutants from the air. Civil engineers carefully control indoor humidity levels, as needed; high humidity can affect electronics equipment, paper (starts to curl), food storage and lab experiments (mold growth), in addition to creating an uncomfortable work environment and moist conditions that cultivate poor air quality.
After this activity, students should be able to:
- Define and explain the terms humidity and saturation.
- Build a simple humidity/saturation model.
- Use data from a model to create a percent scale.
- Explain how meteorologists and engineers use humidity information.
- Explain how humidity affects local weather conditions.