In the first seconds of this experience we can see that it is not that easy to burn a piece of wood. If we approach a flame to a piece of wood, it will hardly burn, or not burn at all.
But, as it happens with other materials, if we divide this material into very small parts, then it becomes much easier.
Using small parts:
Let us see what happens to sawdust, that is nothing more than wood reduced to very small particles.
We are going to put a small portion of sawdust inside this tube that has holes in the bottom that communicate with this flexible tube through the base.
Now we are going to burn this little candle and hang it at the top of the tube. I’m going to blow the flexible tube to create a cloud of sawdust particles.
The result:
We can see that the particles in the cloud can easily ignite, if they have a source of ignition, something we couldn’t do with a piece of wood. The moment there wasn’t enough oxygen inside the tube, the candle went out.
