Will there be many different colors in a marker?

Question

I colored in a circle and pored water on it to see if i could find all the different colors but couldn't.

Answer 1

Color with a blue marker and then color over it with a yellow marker and you should have green.

Answer 2

i think there is only one color per marker

Answer 3

use a black marker - they are usually a mixture of colours

Answer 4

It may be the marker you used was water soluble, but most markers use an organic solvent base. In that case you'd need a fairly non-polar liquid, like toluene or similar, to get the ink blot to spread. If you can't find that, try rubbing alcohol or acetone. You may also want to try different kinds of paper or cloth.

What you're actually doing here is a very simple version of paper chromatography, where an advancing solvent front allows molecules of different retention to separate out into pure bands. It may be that the marker ink does not contain different molecular species that produce a different color, or the ink itself may spread over everything and cover it up, so you won't see any visible results. Also, if all your molecules bind strongly to the paper, you won't see any separation, but if the binding is weak you might get some visible results. So there is no guarantee this will work, but good luck.

Answer 5

Just because you can mix red and blue paint to make purple paint doesn't mean you can wash the red or blue out of the purple paint once it's mixed.