A Scavenger Hunt for Bay Area Chemistry Nerds

Photo taken by fdecomiteScavenger and puzzle hunts are great fun. Not only do they challenge you with clues to solve, but a teams' strength is also largely based on how well they can collaborate with others to come up with the right answers.

One of the more unique scavenger hunts I came across is happening on January 8th in San Francisco. Chemistry in Pictures is a photo scavenger hunt hosted by the Meetup group Experiment with a Chemist.

Chemistry in Pictures asks teams to bring a digital camera (one per team) and follow the clues provided. Each of your discoveries will need to be photographed within a two hour time frame. At the end you'll share your pictures that contain each of the clues and then explain them to the other teams. How awesome and wonderfully nerdy is that?

Here are some examples of clues teams may encounter:

Oxygen (answers may include molecules with oxygen such as water, carbonic acid in soda, Bleach, sugar)
A Crosslinked polymer
A product containing the vitamin Linus Pauling would have suggested that you increase
A sulfur containing product that you eat
An oxidizer
A reducer
Build a molecule of caffeine
Draw a nucleophillic substitution reaction

This sounds like a great event to kick off the New Year. If you'd like to learn more about puzzle hunts of all kinds, visit Puzzalot for more events in the Bay Area.

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