What are chemicals?

Chemicals are elements, or a combination of elements, with a specific composition and structure. All matter is made of chemicals!

For example, hydrogen and oxygen are both chemicals individually, and there are many combinations of hydrogen and oxygen that form chemicals, such as water (H2O) or hydrogen peroxide (H2O2).

-They Might Be Giants do an amazing job defining chemicals in their song “Meet the Elements”: “They either combine to make a chemical compound or stand alone as they team up with other elements making compounds when they combine”

-Here’s Tom Lehrer’s classic song “The Elements” animated!