system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5:How do glowsticks work?
gpt
Glows ticks contain two primary chemicals; a base catalyst (which is used to speed up the reaction) and a dye such as fluorophor.

The small glass capsule you can see in an unlit glowstick typically contains both phenyl oxylate and the aforementioned fluorescent dye.
When you 'crack' a glowstick what you are really doing is breaking this glass capsule, which in turn causes the contained solution to enter the larger tube of the glowstick, typically filled with a hydrogen peroxide solution.

When the two solutions mix, an exothermic reaction takes place which creates the glowing light through a process known as chemiluminesence.

And that's what makes the glowstick glow!