Explaining the Mystery of Prince Rupert’s Drop, A Curious Exploding Glass Object

In this fascinating video, Destin of Smarter Every Day takes an in-depth look at the curious phenomena of Prince Rupert’s Drop, a tadpole-shaped glass object that is created when molten glass is dripped into water. The drops have unusual characteristics—the head is extremely resilient and can resist a hammer blow. However, if the tail is even slightly damaged, the whole drop will disintegrate explosively. In the video, Destin explains the unusual behavior of Prince Rupert’s Drop and films them exploding with a Phantom high speed camera at up to 130,000 frames per second.

via Digg