New research about nano burning, have question

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090409152740.htm

Here is my question about that. It mentions an organic fuel and an oxidizer, in this case copper oxide. How can an oxide be an oxidizer, it already has undergone an oxidation reaction.

Originally posted by sonhouse
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090409152740.htm

Here is my question about that. It mentions an organic fuel and an oxidizer, in this case copper oxide. How can an oxide be an oxidizer, it already has undergone an oxidation reaction.

If you put one oxide with a metal that has a higher affinity for oxygen then the oxygen moves across, thus oxidizing the other metal.

Originally posted by twhitehead
If you put one oxide with a metal that has a higher affinity for oxygen then the oxygen moves across, thus oxidizing the other metal.

But the fuel is organic, not metallic. So if you put Zinc next to copper oxide, the result would be zinc oxide and pure copper precipitate?

Originally posted by sonhouse
But the fuel is organic, not metallic. So if you put Zinc next to copper oxide, the result would be zinc oxide and pure copper precipitate?

It is basically an exothermic chemical reaction as is most burning. The only difference between it and burning in air is that instead of pure oxygen, we have copper oxide as one of the reactants.

The article you quote is comparing it to gunpowder. I suspect the reaction would be similar to that of gunpowder which you can of course learn about here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunpowder

Note that it is all about the movement of oxygen from the 'oxidizer' to the 'fuel'.