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Something like an egg exploding when cooking in a microwave is due to what might be called differential heating. Microwaves don't heat the items put in the microwave evenly. You know how this works from experience. Let's look.

If you put eggs in a hot pan and pour on more heat, you can burn the bottom of the eggs before the tops cook and set. The heat can't "penetrate" or "travel" up through the egg to cook the top before the bottom burns. That thermal energy (heat) can only move so fast through the egg. You can burn it on the bottom without cooking the top. It's similar in a microwave.

Microwaves penetrate food to cook it "inside" as well as on the outside, but they don't do it evenly. Anyone one who has heated more than a few things in a microwave knows this. In spite of a turning platform (and possibly a stirrer in the top), the microwave energy is not directed to or absorbed evenly by the food. Hot spots can develop, and an egg can explode due to the difference in the way the microwave energy is absorbed by and heats the egg.

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14y ago

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