Glass Education for Students, Teachers & General Public

Glass Education & Videos

Below is a collection of glass related information and video clips that we have prepared and collected for the general science enthusiast. This also includes material provided by other researchers and links to other great resources available on the web. Let us know if you have other good resources to add!

Sugar Glass - Exploring glass science through hard candy

The materials below are designed to provide a low-cost, hands-on approach to exploring aspects of real material science, focusing on glass science. One of our favorite glass materials is candy glass, an unflavored variety of "hard candy". This can be made from common kitchen ingredients including cane sugar (sucrose), corn syrup and water. The experiment introduces the student to properties of the glass state, how to make their own glass-like materials and interesting experiments from fiber pulling to refractive index, from crystallization kinetics to measiring the glass transition temperature by thermal analysis - all from the kitchen lab. Click to View Video>
Our emphasis is on learning science through participation with materials and experiments. While our hands-on activities are all designed to be low-cost, they still capture real material science principles and remain open-ended. Some of our more advanced experiments include the using simple micro-controllers and electronic ICs to build powerful instruments for measurement and control.

Educational Resources for Teachers

Teacher Workshop: Candy Glass Workshop as undertaken at the 2012 American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) Meeting. Includes links to general information; discussion slides; experiments & procedures; other related home-built glass science

Introduction to Glass and Sugar Glass Experiments

• Sugar Glass demo video of lecture with candy glass making and fiber pulling activity by Bill Heffner, IMI-NFG, Aug. 2007 (Total running time: 46 minutes, streamed video file).
• Summary of all Low Cost, Hands On Experiments:
  
• Building a Low Cost, Hands-On Learning Curriculum for Glass Science & Engineering Using Candy Glass, An Overview. (Mat. Res. Symp. Proc. Vol 1233, Fall 2009). A paper by W. Heffner and H. Jain (PDF file)
• Low-Cost, Experimental Curriculum in Materials Science Using Candy Glass Part 2: Home-Built Apparatuses, W. Heffner and H. Jain, presented at MRS Fall 2013 Meeting.

How to Make Candy Glass - with Simple Recipe

• Candy glass recipe, instructions and worksheet
  (PDF file) by Bill Heffner, IMI-NFG
• Making Sugar Glass at home Video
  (Video) presented by Bill Heffner, 2008
• Candy Glass at the University Lecture
  (Video) presented by H. Jain

Experiments with Candy and Candy Glass

General Experiments:

• Learning the Principles of Glass Science from Candy Making
  by Himanshu and Isha Jain (2001 paper).

Fiber Drawing and Related Experiments:

• Fiber Drawing Tower
  (Pdf file) by W. Heffner
• Sugar glass fiber drawing video Short video on drawing glassy fibers from candy made from sucrose, corn syrup and water. The video emphasizes the importance of having the right temperature to draw fibers.
• Fiber Drawing Presentation - including a Core-Clad Double Crucible Method
  (pdf) by Tara Schneider, IMI REU 2005

Refractive Index and Density Experiments:

• Measuring Refractive index of Candy Glass
  by Tara Schneider, IMI REU 2005
• Measuring Densities of Candy Glassess
  by Sean Kelly, IMI REU 2006

Crystallization in Glass Experiments:

• Crystallization in Sugar Glass and Its Melts - Low Cost Experiments in Glass
  Poster presened at Glass & Optical Materials Division of Maerican Ceramics Society, May 2010
• A study of Crystallization of Sugar Glasses
  (PDF file) showing how the proportion of sucrose to corn syrup effects the tendency of a sugar glass to crystallize.
• A Crystallization Primer - with Nucleation and Growth
  (PDF file) by Bill Heffner on the basic concepts
• Home Built Temperature Controlled Chamber
  (Pdf file) A low cost apparatus for temperature control made from a light bulb, coffee cans and a dimmer switch enable students to perform a variety of experiments.
• Surface Crystallization Rate of Sugar Glasses
  (Pdf file) A quantitative experiment for the home or high school lab.
  This student's presentation on her Sugar Crystallization Project won awards at the 2007 Pennsylvania Jr. Academy of Science as well as the Delaware Valley Science Fair

Thermal Analysis and Glass Transition Experiments:

• Home Built DTA for Measuring Glass Transition
  A quantitative experiment for the home or high school lab
• HowToBuild a DTA Apparatus - Part 1 (pdf)
  A more lengthy description of how to build the DTA as well as some results for a stearic acid reference sample and the Tg of some candy glass samples.
• A Low-cost, Student-built Differential Thermal Analysis (DTA) Apparatus for Measuring Glass Transition
  (Ppt presentation) Presentation from AAPT Winter Meeting, 2011
• A Low-cost Student Built DTA for Exploring the Glass Transition
  (Pdf file) Poster presentation from 2010 Glass & Optical Materials Division of American Ceramics Society, May 2010

Electrical Conductivity and Glass Transition:

• A Low-cost Electrometer for Measuring Conductivity and Glass Transition in Sugar Glass
  (Pdf file) Poster presentation from 2011 Glass & Optical Materials Division of American Ceramics Society, May 2010
• Coming soon: low-cost experiments with photo-active chalcogenide glass
  

Other useful links:
"Edible Glass" : link to educational pages from Cornell website.

Glass Fracture - Understanding the science around us

From broken windows to auto crash scenes, most of us already have observed some of the unique features characteristic of the "glass fracture". In the materials below explores and explains some of these familiar observations as well as some of the techniques that scientists are using to improve the strength and safety of glass.

Glass Fracture from Sandia Labs

• Sandia Presentation on Glass Fracture and Strengthening
  by Dr. Jill Glass, Sandia Laboratories. This PDF presentation illustrates example of glass fractureand discussed strengthening through ion exchange methods.
• SandiaVideo - bending plate
  This video provides a powerful illustration of the enormous improvement in strength (and flexural extent) possible from modifying the glass surface. This video was provided by Jill Glass of Sandia National Laboratories.
• Exploding window Video - Sandia
  This video illustrated the danger one faces from a simple glass window during an explosion and the highlights the concern for improving the way ion which glass fractures. The video was made at New Mexico Tech for Sandia National Laboratories.

Glass Fracture from Penn State University

Some interesting information on brittle fracture can be found on Penn State University website of David Green at: http://www.ems.psu.edu/~green/djg.html

• PSU video of cracks forming glass surface during flex testing
  This link from Prof. Green's website requires QuickTime™ Player

Museum of Glass

• Rupert's drop -This video from Museum of Glass in Tacoma, WA provides a dramatic example of how pre-stressing a glass surface through rapid quenching can produce amazing phenomena.
• The Corning Museum of Glass also has a great descriptive page entitled Prince Rupert's Drop and Glass Stress

International Collaboration on Glass Mechanics (ICGM)

• Glass Strength and Flaws and ICGM site by C.R. "Chuck" Kurkjian provides a nice paper presented by Kurkjian and W.R. (Bill) Prindle at the 1st International Congress on Ceramics in Toronto, Canada in June 2006. It provides a personal view of some history of glass mechanics as well as a "roadmap" for stronger glass. Link to Kurkjian´s history paper

Other interesting links

• "A Day Made of Glass 2 ... Made possible by Corning"
  A You-Tube video that extends the ideas, applications, and interfaces introduced in the original video (below) into new arenas – including healthcare and education – continuing the story of how highly engineered glass, with companion technologies, will help shape
  our world.
  For those curious to learn more about the technologies presented in the video, we also created an “Unpacked” version that pauses now and again to provide more details
• "A Day Made of Glass... Made possible by Corning"
  A You-Tube video on the future in glass applications
• "As Unbreakable as .......Glass?"
In depth article published in The New York Times (07.07.09)
• "Tempered Glass Story"
  A You-Tube video on tempered glass
• Educational Material with experiments for Pre-College Students and Teachers
  
• Summer Camps on Glass (more information will be posted soon)
• Partnership with local Science Discovery Center - Candy Glass
• PA Glass Trail
• NSF-backed outreach project with Tuskegee University