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MARCIAC. BONNEAU
the trading post Turmeric as an Acid-Base Indicator C. H. Breedlove Montgomery Community College Rockville, MD 20850 Many plant products make reasonably good acid-base indicators. I was reminded of this one evening several years ago when I was teaching a class for nonscience majors. Just prior to meeting the class, I was enjoying a delicious hot fish souo that mv wife had o r e ~ a r e dusine a tastv variety of seasoning ingridients, inciuding the coldiment, turmeric. To keeo the sou^ hot. she had out it in a widemouth ''thennos" bottle. As the time to begin my class was fast approaching, I hurriedly finished off the remainder of my soup by inverting and drinking it directly from the thermos. The fact that I had a snowy-white beard and mustache should have made me more cautious about consuming the soup in such a manner, but I was in a hurry
540
Journal of Chemical Education
SUNY-Coltland Coltland, NY 13045
Several minutes into the class, I noticed several of my s t u d e n t s laughing and commenting to each other. I stopped talking and asked them to share with me what they found so amusing about the topic. They suggested I look in a mirror. Quickly, I went into the men's room and noticed that the facial hair above my mouth was now a bright yellow color! Recognizing what had probably happened to produce the t liauid soaD on mv mustache and rubbed color. I ~ u some hriskly,then wiped;t off wi'th a towel. I looked into the mirror a w i n and to my astonishment, the earlier vellow color hadnow been replaced by a brilliant almost dayd o orange. I returned to the classroom and launched into teaching a n impromptu lesson on the alkalinity of soap and its effect on turmeric, clearly a natural indicator. Literature Cited 1. Mwrk Inder, 11th ed., compound X9732.
