Mentos: Frothy

Today’s fact is less original than some of the others, but I’m doing it anyway for the simple fact that you must see the video below if you haven’t already. It’s absolute genius.

So the fact is: Mentos + Diet Coke = crazy explosion of fizz.

For once, I have done some research into the science behind this physics-class phenomenon. For some reason (oh dear, there goes the scientific gravitas), Mentos have greater surface tension than other ‘small oblate spheroids’ – round things – as well as a number of little pot-holes on said tense surface. Something called ‘nucleation’ occurs in the pot-holes, and carbon dioxide is released so rapidly that the whole thing turns into ‘a raging foam’.

Phew. Here’s the video:



While engrossed in the scientific volumes necessary to write the technical paragraph above, I discovered some very pointless things about Mentos, including the fact that ‘the typical Mentos roll is approximately 3/4-inch in diameter, 6/16-inches tall and 1.3 ounces.’ That’s right: approximately 6/16 of an inch*.

Most interestingly, however, you can recreate the experiment within your very stomach by eating a handful of Mentos and downing some Diet Coke! It ‘can result in people regurgitating the foamy result (as evidenced by numerous online videos)’, although ‘no actual news accounts exist of anyone dying from it.’

I must source these regurgitatory videos at once.

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* And hello, surely that’s 3/8? Take that, boffins!