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The difference between corrosion and oxidation?

Hi I am in 8th grade,

For my science project, I need to know the difference between corrosion and oxidation.
So can you please help me?
It'll be really great if you could help me!

Thank you very much!

Coko M
K-12 student - Okinawa, Japan
February 25, 2009

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February 25, 2009

Hi, Coko. Words are a short way for expressing concepts, so their meaning can depend on the context. If you go to the beach and you "bake" in the sun, you know that you don't really "bake" in the same sense that cookies bake in the oven.

Oxidation can mean two different things: it can mean that some material chemically combines with oxygen, like when wood burns in air to form ash and smoke, or rust forms on metal -- but it also has a broader meaning that the material's valence state or oxidation state has been raised and it has dissolved into a liquid like acid. Corrosion generally implies a harmful deterioration of a metal; this can be due to oxidation (the metal rusting), but it can also be due to other things like the metal dissolving in acid.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey

Great 8th grade answer. It certainly will help narrow any additional research that he chooses to do. Jim

James Watts
- Navarre, Florida
February 25, 2009