Aerogel Cookies
Chocolate chip cookie dough with the chips removed is a model for aerogels.Copyright 2020 Marjorie Langston, University of Akron RET
Students learn about the properties and potential tremendous uses of aerogels by using a simple (and tasty) model: chocolate chip cookie dough. Students create a design as a means for removing the chips from the cookie dough while leaving the holes intact. This mimics the process by which polymer engineering create pores in gels producing aerogels.
Materials engineers make aerogels, a synthetic porous ultralight material derived from a gel, in which the liquid component for the gel has been replaced with a gas, by creating a gel with an emulsifying agent in it which is removed via solution exchange before being dried with super critical carbon dioxide. The process leaves behind a solid with lots of pores called an aerogel. By exploring aerogels, engineers are seeking ways to create designs with varied sized pores, of varying properties, and of lower costs. Students will model the process of creating an aerogel and will learn that engineers sometimes design processes as well as products.
After this activity, students should be able to:
- Understand properties and uses and potential of aerogels.
- Apply the engineering design process to the design.
- Communicate brainstormed ideas and perform clear research.