Schematic illustration of a water drop.

Sticky Water

Can You Pick Stuff Up with Water?

 

Materials

  • piece of tape
  • eye dropper
  • small container of water
  • plate
  • black pepper flakes

Try This

  1. Pour a pinch of pepper on the plate.
  2. See if you can pick up some of the pepper using the tape.
  3. Fill the eye dropper with water.
  4. Push a single drop of water out the end of the eye dropper. Keep it attached to the end of the eye dropper.
  5. See if you can pick up any pepper flakes using the drop of water at the end of the eye dropper.

What's Going On?

We don't usually think of water as sticky, but it is. The pepper stuck to the water just like it stuck to the tape. When water has nothing else to stick to, it sticks to itself. That's why raindrops are mostly round. If water wasn't sticky at all, you would have trouble getting your toothbrush wet to brush your teeth, and taking a shower wouldn't work, because you'd stay dry the whole time.

Schematic illustration of a dish filled with black pepper flakes and an eye dropper.