Every time I do a demonstration in the classroom that involves fire, I am reminded of the story that Lise Meitner told of Emil Fischer at the University of Berlin in 1907, the year she first arrived. Meitner was not allowed into the laboratories, and for over a year had to work in a makeshift basement laboratory, with a separate street entrance. This meant a further delay in learning experimental methods she was most interested in. Apparently, Fischer feared that women might “set their hair alight,” based on incident involving a Russian student with an exotic hairstyle. Some have pointed out that Fischer himself had a long beard.
Anyways, here I am with the classic Rubens flame tube demonstration, a beautiful visual representation of standing waves in a tube. My colleague, George Spagna, has written about how the Rubens tube is more complicated that it first may seem. And somehow, I have managed not to catch my hair on fire. (Knock on wood.)
Below you can see the standing wave.
