The Staff of the Division of Chemical Engineering, Thad D. Farr, compiler, Phosphorus, Properties of the Element and Some of Its Compounds , U.S. Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1950. The third nonmetal considered in this lecture is carbon which is found in a variety of forms. Wood charcoal, coke, graphite, even diamond and the recently discovered buckminsterfullerene are all forms of carbon. Carbon is a major component of living things. When carbon is completely combusted, carbon dioxide is formed.
Carbon dioxide is a colorless, odorless, gas that extinguishes a flame.
The presence of the gas can be detected by bubbling it through limewater. A precipitate of calcium carbonate appears. Carbon dioxide is also formed in the naturally observed phenomenon of fermentation. There are also several compounds of carbon and hydrogen. One of these is methane, which is known as natural gas.