How to do the Blue Bottle Chemistry demonstration

Bute Andreea, Decuseară Tatiana, Ispas Miruna
“Vasile Alecsandri” High School, Galati, Romania

In this chemistry demonstration, a blue solution gradually becomes clear. When the flask of liquid is swirled around, the solution becomes blue again. Instructions are given for performing the reaction, the chemistry is explained, and options for making red -> clear -> red and green -> red/yellow -> green color change reactions are explained. The blue bottle reaction is easy to perform and uses readily-available materials.

Materials
• tap water
• two 1-liter Erlenmeyer flasks, with stoppers
• 7.5 g glucose (2.5 g for one flask; 5 g for the other flask)
• 7.5 g sodium hydroxide NaOH (2.5 g for one flask; 5 g for the other flask)
• 0.1% solution of methylene blue (1 ml for each flask)

Procedure
1. Half-fill two one-liter Erlenmeyer flasks with tap water.
2. Dissolve 2.5 g of glucose in one of the flask (flask A) and 5 g of glucose in the other flask (flask B).
3. Dissolve 2.5 g of sodium hydroxide (NaOH) in flask A and 5 g of NaOH in flask B.
4. Add ~1 ml of 0.1% methylene blue to each flask.
5. Stopper the flasks and shake them to dissolve the dye. The resulting solution will be blue.
6. Set the flasks aside (this is a good time to explain the chemistry of the demonstration). The liquid will gradually become colorless as glucose is oxidized by the dissolved dioxygen. The effect of concentration on reaction rate should be obvious. The flask with twice the concentration uses the dissolved oxygen in about half the time as the other solution. A thin blue boundary can be expected to remain at the solution-air interface, since oxygen remains available via diffusion.
7. The blue color of the solutions can be restored by swirling or shaking the contents of the flask.
8. The reaction can be repeated several times.

Safety & Clean-Up
Avoid skin contact with the solutions, which contain caustic chemicals.
he reaction neutralizes the solution, which can be disposed of by pouring it down the drain.

How the Blue Bottle Reaction Works
In this reaction, glucose (an aldehyde) in an alkaline solution is slowly oxidized by dioxygen to form gluconic acid:
CH2OH–CHOH–CHOH–CHOH–CHOH–CHO + 1/2 O2 --> CH2OH–CHOH–CHOH–CHOH–CHOH–COOH
Gluconic acid is converted to sodium gluconate in the presence of sodium hydroxide. Methylene blue speeds up this reaction by acting as an oxygen transfer agent. By oxidizing glucose, methylene blue is itself reduced (forming leucomethylene blue), and becomes colorless.
If there is a sufficient available oxygen (from air), leucomethylene blue is re-oxidized and the blue color of solution can be restored. Upon standing, glucose reduces the methylene blue dye and the color of the solution disappears.
In dilute solutions the reaction takes place at 40-60°C, or at room temperature (described here) for more concentrated solutions.