Why do some things explode instead of simply burn?
In: Chemistry
it’s not only about energy release, which could just mean things get very hot, like thermite
What an explosion is, is a pressure wave. A rapid increase in pressure and that pushes away the things around it. Things that explode tend to go from a state where there is tightly packed atoms or molecules to a state of gas. In gas form, things want to take a lot more space. That forms the rapid increase in pressure.
Things that only burn don’t change from solid to gas, but rather they give parts of themselves to something that is already a gas – eg they give carbon molecules to oxygen in the air, forming carbon monoxide or carbon dioxide(CO2).
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