Clouds In A Bottle

Date_________ Laboratory _________ Title FLAT BOTTOM CLOUDS (PART 1) Introduction You have probably heard people say hot air rises, after all isnt that why hot air balloons rise Well, if this were the case shouldnt we be sun bathing instead of skiing on the mountaintops What happened to all that hot air There must be more to this story. In this laboratory you will be investigating how pressure affects the temperature of air and how this relates to the formation of clouds in the troposphere. You will form a cloud in a bottle, find the dew point and relative humidity of air at different places in the school and use a chart to estimate how high that air would have to rise to form a cloud. Part 1 In order to explore how clouds form in the atmosphere we have to examine the relationship between changes in air pressure and temperature. As air rises in the atmosphere the air pressure decreases. This is because there is less air (atmosphere) above it pushing down. You will be adding air to a two liter soda-pop bottle and examine what happens to the mass and temperature of the air inside the bottle. Data Table 1 Problem What happens to air temperature when pressure increases Hypothesis __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Materials Digital Scale, empty 2 liter bottle, fizz keeper pressure pump, thermometer, smoke from incense Procedure Part 1 Relationships Attach a pressure pump to a two-liter bottle. Measure the Mass the container and record the temperature. Pump 30 times. Record mass and temperature each 30 pumps. Complete Data Table then release the pressure and record data. Define a scale for mass and temperature and graph your data. Connect your data points for mass and temperature (two lines). The Affects of Pressure changes on both Mass and Temperature 0 30 60 90 120