Dry ice, sometimes referred to as "Cardice" or as "card ice" (chiefly British English), is the solid form of carbon dioxide. It is used primarily as a cooling agent. Its advantages include lower temperature than that of water ice and not leaving any residue (other than incidental frost from moisture in the atmosphere). It is useful for preserving frozen foods, ice cream, etc., where mechanical cooling is unavailable.
Dry ice sublimates at −78.5 °C (−109.3 °F) at atmospheric pressure. This extreme cold makes the solid dangerous to handle without protection due to burns caused by freezing (frostbite). While generally not very toxic, the outgassing from it can cause hypercapnia due to buildup in confined locations.
Read more about Dry Ice: Properties, History, Manufacture, Safety, Occurrence On Mars
Famous quotes containing the words dry and/or ice:
“‘Tis not such lines as almost crack the stage
When Bajazet begins to rage;
Nor a tall met’phor in the bombast way,
Nor the dry chips of short-lunged Seneca.
Nor upon all things to obtrude
And force some odd similitude.
What is it then, which like the power divine
We only can by negatives define?”
—Abraham Cowley (1618–1667)
“Every incident connected with the breaking up of the rivers and ponds and the settling of the weather is particularly interesting to us who live in a climate of so great extremes. When the warmer days come, they who dwell near the river hear the ice crack at night with a startling whoop as loud as artillery, as if its icy fetters were rent from end to end, and within a few days see it rapidly going out. So the alligator comes out of the mud with quakings of the earth.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)