Question

If I had a long cylindrical balloon filled with air and I leave it out in the open for a while. Will the gases arrange themselves according to their density ?

• A. Yes, they will settle in such a way that the densest gas is at the bottom.
• B. No, they will still remain a mixture
• C. I don't know
• D. Nice question, I never thought about this

Answer 1

The correct option is B

No, they will still remain a mixture

So the answer is they will still remain a random mixture of its constituent gases. I know this goes against Archimedes' principles. The issue is the molecules of gases are more interspersed than the molecules of liquids and the random movement because of collisions is much more pronounced in a gas. The effect of this is much stronger than the effect of the forces of gravity as their mass is less.