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What is air?
When you run, you can feel air rushing through your
hair. You can see wind rustling leaves or lifting a kite high above the
treetops. Air is all around you. Yet when you're still, you might not
notice it at all.
Air is 78% nitrogen. Nitrogen is a very stable gas.
It does not easily react, or combine, with other substances.
Air is 21% oxygen. Both people and animals need
oxygen to survive.
About 1% of air is small amounts of many gases.
Argon makes up most of this 1%, but tiny amounts of carbon dioxide,
methane, helium, hydrogen, krypton, neon, ozone, and xenon are also part
of air.
Gases make up dry air. Air also contains water
droplets, ice crystals, and tiny solid particles like dust, ash from
volcanoes and factories, plant pollen, and bacteria. Scientists do not
consider these things really “part” of air.
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on air.
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