Page 4 - Lab Notebook

Using Chemicals

Do: • Use only designated chemicals.
• Use as little reagent as needed to perform the experiment.
• Read labels and follow directions carefully.
• Use clean test tubes or beakers for carrying liquids.
• Use beakers, watch glasses, or small squares of paper for carrying solids.
• Pour the reagent solutions into your own containers, in order to avoid contamination of
the stock solutions.
• Hold bottle stoppers in your hand instead of setting them down to avoid picking up any
impurities from the bench and thus contaminating the solution when the stopper is put
back on the bottle.
• Replace stopper or cap tightly to avoid evaporation or spillage.
• When making dilute acid solutions from concentrated acids, always add acid to water
(Figure 1).
• When instructed to smell a chemical, gently waft the fumes from the container toward
your nose as shown illustrated below instead of smelling directly (Figure 2).

ACID

Always add
acid to water.

Water
Figure 1 Figure 2

Do not: • Conduct unauthorized experiments.
• Contaminate the reagents.
• Return unused chemicals to the stock bottles, as this may affect other student’s experiments.
• Carry reagent bottles to your bench.
• Insert your own pipettes or medicine droppers into the reagent bottles.
• Inhale deeply from an unknown container.
• Taste any of the chemicals used in the lab.

Clean up

• Clean up and properly dispose of all spills—liquids or solids—immediately. This is especially important in
and around the balances. Some corrosive chemicals may permanently damage equipment or laboratory
fixtures.

• All chemicals to be discarded should be thrown into the appropriately labeled waste containers and record
them on the waste inventory sheet. Wastepaper belongs in the wastebaskets. Broken glass should only be
discarded in the appropriate containers.

• At the close of each laboratory period, leave your glassware clean and dry. Wash and wipe off the bench top.