The Art of DIY Mood Rings: Uncovering the Science Behind Thermochromic Liquid Crystals

So we bought these online and so I think this isn't actually the chemical that's used in mood rings, but it's like a paper version of it. So how does that work? Well, there are these things called microencapsulated crystals, for instance. If these were just stagnant, they would be showing the color black and stable. But if they started to warm up, they would shift and change and those crystals would start reflecting light in the space between the crystals. That's how you get these different colors happening.

The process of creating microencapsulated crystals involves a lot of intense technology and tools that make it difficult to DIY this kind of material straight from the earth. It's not as simple as just going for a walk in the woods and finding these crystals like in a cave or something. These color-changing crystals are manufactured using advanced techniques and equipment, which is why they're so complex.

We're back in our studio now and we have our thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheets that we're going to try to DIY some stuff out of. We also got some epoxy stickers with clear sticky fronts and jewelry backing. The key thing here is that the material has to be touching your skin, like even if we do a necklace that hangs down, our body heat probably isn't going to affect the thermochromic liquid crystals unless the actual temperature changes.

We didn't grab a base for a ring because we couldn't find any that were thin enough that we knew the mood ring could actually work through it. Looking back in the '90s, they didn't even work when they were sitting on your skin; you had to warm them up. It's interesting to note that even if a mood ring was touching your skin, it wouldn't change color unless it warmed up.

Let's start with a choker. Is this too big of a choker? Because we got these amazing epoxy stickers, I'm just going to stick one of these on here and then cut it out. This actually has a sticky backing, so it's already easy. I'll get the cord and put it inside our little thing here and see what happens. Look at that; it immediately turned black. Obviously, it's not feeling the warmth of my skin anymore.

It's exciting to experiment with these materials and learn about their properties. We love how you can just cut them up and use them in different ways. This DIY project has been a lot of fun, and I learned so much about thermochromic liquid crystals. They're more complex than I ever knew, but the process of creating them is fascinating.

The thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheets do react to your skin and change color, but I didn't think they would when they were put in a base like this necklace base. The metal conducts heat, which is why it was able to change color. If you had a ring base, we could try working with that as long as it wasn't too thick, and not too much glue was ruining the conduction between the metal and the thermochromic liquid crystal sheet.

We didn't realize just how difficult it would be to DIY mood rings until we tried it ourselves. These crystals come in paper science books and are not easily replicable at home. However, with online resources like Google's making and science team, anyone can learn about these materials and buy them for experimentation.

If you're interested in stuff like this, make sure to keep watching science videos on YouTube. There are many niches that you find in YouTube, and they often open up new worlds of discovery. Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe if you enjoyed learning with us today. We'll see you next time bye.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhi everyone my name is Kelsey and my name is Becky and we are the story girls we are here today to answer a very important question I know you guys have all been dying to know can you DIY a mood ring what we grew up as '90s kids and these mood rings were everywhere everywhere and now that the ' 90s are back we're wondering can we DIY them we're like oh we should actually have one to wear for this video and then turns out we couldn't even find one so this is even more important more important so today we are working with Google making and science team to go meet a very fun scientist who's going to help us understand if it's even possible to DIY these things so let's head over to the lab to find out if we can DIY mood rings okay so I'm here with Lisa who's the lab director at action potential lab I want to make a mood ring can you tell me if that's possible so basically thermochromic liquid crystals that's what makes mood rings they're also used in thermometers and other kinds of Home devices it's pretty neat in that it can tell the temperature visually so we bought these online and so I think this isn't actually the chemical that in mood rinks this is like a paper version of it correct so how does that work so how it works is actually there's these things called micro encapsulated crystals for instance if these were the crystals uh if they were just stagnant they would be showing the color black and stable but if they started to warm up they would shift and change and those crystals would start start to reflect light in the space between the crystals and that's how you get these different colors happening and it's been actually um microencapsulated so not only that it's been coated and protected and then mixed with a bunch of other materials so that it can be printed on all different kinds of cool novelty things like this paper and mood ring these are manufactured um elements and it uses a lot of intense technology and tools so it's not so easy to DIY this kind of material straight from the earth I can't just go for a walk in the woods and find these crystals like in a cave or something not so much not really these color changing ones okay so we're back in our studio now and we have our thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheets that we're going to try to DIY some stuff out of we also got some like epoxy stickers so like clear sticky front front a jewelry backing that you can put it into some cord or thing of making like some necklaces and chokers um because the key thing is here it has to be touching your skin like even if we do a necklace that hangs down here our body heat probably isn't going to affect the thermochromic liquid crystals unless the actual temperature that you're in changes so like going from outside to inside then you're going to see a change in color so we didn't grab a base of a ring because we couldn't find any that were thin enough that we knew the mood ring could actually work through it and I think now looking back in the '90s they didn't even work when they were sitting on your skin you had to like warm it up it didn't even work because it was touching your skin anyways what should we start with a choker is this too big of a choker so because we got these amazing epoxy stickers I'm just going to stick one of these on here and then cut it out and this actually has a sticky backing so it's already so easy going to stick the appropriate sized epoxy cover gem thing get it all the bub and you guys can see that it's actually working let's cut this take off the sticky backing and plop it inside our little thing here and it immediately turned black so obviously it's not feeling the warmth of my skin anymore although look it is going through that's awesome we're just taking some cord and putting it on vibes Vibes yeah it actually looks really cool very Victorian oh my gosh so exciting guys okay so let's see what else we can BR with these I love how you can just cut them up and use them so that was so much fun and I learned so much like like they this little like '90s fashion trend is so much more complex than I ever knew what this actually turned out out better than I thought because I know that the thermochromic uh Liquid Crystal sheets do react to your skin and they change color but I didn't think that they would when they were put in like a base so like that necklace base I thought that the metal you know wouldn't really conduct but since it does conduct heat um it was able to change color so if you had a ring base yeah you could we would work as long as it wasn't too thick and you didn't maybe have too much glue that was like ruining the conduction between the metal and the thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheet so it turns out you kind of sort of can DIY mooding oh my God but you can't really DIY the crystals that come in the paper science what science yeah but we will definitely link below where we got our thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheets so that you guys if you want to experiment with this you can they weren't too much I think they were between like $5 and $10 yes just the shipping that gets you every time so thank you so much to Google's making and science team for encouraging us to learn about this and buy these crazy crystals online cuz I never would have without that nope and make sure you guys if you're interested in stuff like this make sure you keep watching science videos there's so many on YouTube you know these niches that you find in YouTube and you're like wait what is this world I'm opening it up thanks for learning with us watching this video and if you like it make sure that you like it if you love it make sure you sub it guys and we'll see you next time byehi everyone my name is Kelsey and my name is Becky and we are the story girls we are here today to answer a very important question I know you guys have all been dying to know can you DIY a mood ring what we grew up as '90s kids and these mood rings were everywhere everywhere and now that the ' 90s are back we're wondering can we DIY them we're like oh we should actually have one to wear for this video and then turns out we couldn't even find one so this is even more important more important so today we are working with Google making and science team to go meet a very fun scientist who's going to help us understand if it's even possible to DIY these things so let's head over to the lab to find out if we can DIY mood rings okay so I'm here with Lisa who's the lab director at action potential lab I want to make a mood ring can you tell me if that's possible so basically thermochromic liquid crystals that's what makes mood rings they're also used in thermometers and other kinds of Home devices it's pretty neat in that it can tell the temperature visually so we bought these online and so I think this isn't actually the chemical that in mood rinks this is like a paper version of it correct so how does that work so how it works is actually there's these things called micro encapsulated crystals for instance if these were the crystals uh if they were just stagnant they would be showing the color black and stable but if they started to warm up they would shift and change and those crystals would start start to reflect light in the space between the crystals and that's how you get these different colors happening and it's been actually um microencapsulated so not only that it's been coated and protected and then mixed with a bunch of other materials so that it can be printed on all different kinds of cool novelty things like this paper and mood ring these are manufactured um elements and it uses a lot of intense technology and tools so it's not so easy to DIY this kind of material straight from the earth I can't just go for a walk in the woods and find these crystals like in a cave or something not so much not really these color changing ones okay so we're back in our studio now and we have our thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheets that we're going to try to DIY some stuff out of we also got some like epoxy stickers so like clear sticky front front a jewelry backing that you can put it into some cord or thing of making like some necklaces and chokers um because the key thing is here it has to be touching your skin like even if we do a necklace that hangs down here our body heat probably isn't going to affect the thermochromic liquid crystals unless the actual temperature that you're in changes so like going from outside to inside then you're going to see a change in color so we didn't grab a base of a ring because we couldn't find any that were thin enough that we knew the mood ring could actually work through it and I think now looking back in the '90s they didn't even work when they were sitting on your skin you had to like warm it up it didn't even work because it was touching your skin anyways what should we start with a choker is this too big of a choker so because we got these amazing epoxy stickers I'm just going to stick one of these on here and then cut it out and this actually has a sticky backing so it's already so easy going to stick the appropriate sized epoxy cover gem thing get it all the bub and you guys can see that it's actually working let's cut this take off the sticky backing and plop it inside our little thing here and it immediately turned black so obviously it's not feeling the warmth of my skin anymore although look it is going through that's awesome we're just taking some cord and putting it on vibes Vibes yeah it actually looks really cool very Victorian oh my gosh so exciting guys okay so let's see what else we can BR with these I love how you can just cut them up and use them so that was so much fun and I learned so much like like they this little like '90s fashion trend is so much more complex than I ever knew what this actually turned out out better than I thought because I know that the thermochromic uh Liquid Crystal sheets do react to your skin and they change color but I didn't think that they would when they were put in like a base so like that necklace base I thought that the metal you know wouldn't really conduct but since it does conduct heat um it was able to change color so if you had a ring base yeah you could we would work as long as it wasn't too thick and you didn't maybe have too much glue that was like ruining the conduction between the metal and the thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheet so it turns out you kind of sort of can DIY mooding oh my God but you can't really DIY the crystals that come in the paper science what science yeah but we will definitely link below where we got our thermochromic Liquid Crystal sheets so that you guys if you want to experiment with this you can they weren't too much I think they were between like $5 and $10 yes just the shipping that gets you every time so thank you so much to Google's making and science team for encouraging us to learn about this and buy these crazy crystals online cuz I never would have without that nope and make sure you guys if you're interested in stuff like this make sure you keep watching science videos there's so many on YouTube you know these niches that you find in YouTube and you're like wait what is this world I'm opening it up thanks for learning with us watching this video and if you like it make sure that you like it if you love it make sure you sub it guys and we'll see you next time bye\n"