You must have enjoyed popcorn with a cold drink while watching a movie in the theatre. But do you know how this popcorn is made from corn? When corn is heated it turns into lava or popcorn. OK! Why does maize turn into lava? Whereas other grains like wheat, peas, gram, etc., do not swell like maize slag. Only maize has this quality. Why this happens, today we tell you the reason.
If you look carefully at the inner part of the maize, you will find that It
is a mixture of starch protein, water, and oil, that is very soft. It surrounds
the outer hard part of the corn (called popcorn or pericarp). When maize is
heated and when the temperature of this mixture reaches 100 degree centigrade,
then the water present in it starts turning into steam, which increases the
pressure in that interior. When the temperature of maize reaches 180 degrees
centigrade, the pressure inside the maize reaches 930 kilopascals (KPa). In a simple
way, it is estimated that this pressure is equal to the pressure on the ground by
the feet of 10 elephants. So much pressure the maize casing cannot bear, then
this steam breaks the casing and comes out, then the maize bursts and takes the
form of lava. In this process, along with the release of pressure, proteins
and starches also increase in volume and take the form of foam.
This process is so fast that even before we can blink our eyes, the corn
explodes and becomes lava. Due to such bursting of maize, the sound of
'burst' comes. You can understand it in the same way as there is a loud
sound after the tire of a bicycle explodes.
Suppose if the maize is heated slowly then the maize will not turn into
popcorn because the steam inside the maize will slowly leak from somewhere from
its cover. But when maize is heated very fast, it definitely turns into popcorn.
Why
does maize grain turn into lava when heated?
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