Joey Green's Mad Scientist

Exploding Life Savers

What You Need

Wint-O-Green Life Savers
Ziploc Storage Bag
Wooden block
Hammer

What to Do
Place one Wint-O-Green Life Saver in the Ziploc Storage Bag. Seal the bag and place it on the wooden block. In a dark room or closet, hold the hammer above the Life Saver. Look directly at the Life Saver as you smash it with the hammer.

What Happens
A quick burst of bluish-green light flashes the moment the wintergreen candy is crushed.

Why It Works
Crushing a crystalline substance, in this case the synthetic wintergreen—methyl salicylate—emits light. This phenomenon is called triboluminescence. According to the Consumer Affairs department at Nabisco, maker of Life Savers, "Regrettably, though our mints' flavor is reliable, their sparking performance is not necessarily consistent. Sometimes the background atmosphere is simply not dark enough. Also, moisture seems to absorb the energy needed to produce sparking."

Bizarre Facts

Cat urine glows under a black light.
In the early 1900s, Cleveland-based chocolate maker Clarence A. Crane developed the idea for white-circle mints, had a pharmaceutical manufacturer produce them on his pill machine, and named them Life Savers because they resembled the flotation device.
Advertisements for Life Savers have included the corny puns hole-some, enjoy-mint, refresh-mint, and content-mint.
Ninety percent of all mints sold today are Life Savers.
Six billion Life Savers are produced every year.
In 1970, the Dow Chemical Company introduced the Ziploc Storage Bag with its patented tongue-in-groove "Gripper Zipper," providing a virtually airtight, watertight seal that revolutionized plastic bags. "Ziploc" is a clever hybrid of the words zipper and lock—a mnemonic device to remind consumers that the bags zip shut and lock tight.

Life-Threatening Life Savers?
In a letter published in the New England Journal of Medicine, two Illinois physicians, Dr. Howard Edward, Jr., and Dr. Donald Edward, warned that biting a Wint-O-Green Life Saver while in an oxygen tent, operating room, or space capsule could be life-threatening. The Journal declared Wint-O-Green Life Savers safe for oxygen tents and gas stations.

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