Question

A student wants to make a cloud in a jar. the student shakes the jar and removes the lid of the jar. steam quickly rises up, out of the jar and disappears into the air. why wasn't the student able to make a cloud in the jar? explain.

Answer 1

as the steam is lighter in weight it prefers to move in upward direction and hence the student is not able to make a cloud in the jar after opening the lid.
if the student would have open the lid by keeping the jar upside down he would have been able to make the cloud in the jar

Answer 2

Clouds form when water vapor rises into the atmosphere and then condenses onto microscopic particles (i.e. dust, dirt and other particles in the air).

In our experiment, the warm water in the jar caused the air inside the jar to heat up. When this happened some of the water evaporated into the air. This evaporation caused water vapor in the jar.

Then the warm moist air (water vapor) rose from the surface of the water to the top of the jar. Once it reached the top of the jar, the warm moist air then began to cool down. This is because of the ice that was on the lid of the jar.

The water vapor in the cooling air then condensed onto the particles of hairspray and formed a cloud in the jar.

If you observe the cloud carefully, you’ll noticed that it swirls around in the jar. This swirling is caused by the circulating air (i.e. warm air rising and cold air sinking).