Tenth Grade, Biotechnology Science Experiments (Page 3)

Making Milk Curdle with Pineapple Enzymes

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Have you ever gone to pour yourself a cup of milk and all you get is milk clumps? What happened to the milk is called coagulation, which is the mechanism that occurs when proteins in the milk clump together. While you do not necessarily want this in your milk, without coagulation (or curdling), there would not be any cheese or yogurt, which is why it is a very important process in the food industry. But what makes milk curdle? In this science project you will use pineapple juice to curdle milk… Read more

Separating Butter with a Salad Spinner Centrifuge

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Imagine that you could make an important piece of laboratory equipment in your kitchen. With this science project idea, you can! You will create your own centrifuge out of a salad spinner and some putty. In science labs, centrifuges are used to separate different liquids and/or solids from each other. You can load your homemade centrifuge with samples and see how they separate. What do you think happens to melted butter in a centrifuge? Read more

Separating Glitter with a Homemade Centrifuge

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

It is fun to shake up a snow globe and watch the "snow" slowly fall. You can imagine that if the snow fell down very quickly it would be disappointing. But there are times when scientists in a laboratory want this to happen. Scientists use samples that have liquid mixed with small, solid pieces (like the inside of a snow globe), and they need all of the solid pieces in a clump, separated from the liquid. Instead of waiting for the pieces to slowly fall out of the liquid, scientists speed up… Read more

Transforming Bacteria to Make Colored Pigments

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Can bacteria be altered to produce life-saving insulin for diabetics? Or change color to indicate the presence of a harmful toxin? Yes, it can! Using biotechnology, scientists work daily on problems like these. It starts with selecting a gene you want bacteria to produce and creating a sequence of DNA that has that gene and a promoter that will help express it at the right time and at the right levels. The next hurdle is actually getting this engineered DNA into the bacteria and… Read more

What Makes a DNA Fingerprint Unique?

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Do you like solving mysteries? In this experiment, you can find out how a DNA fingerprint can help you figure out whodunit. The answer might just be in the "sequence" of events! Read more

A Magnetic Primer Designer

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

How do scientists "copy" DNA? They use a process called the Polymerase Chain Reaction, or PCR. The key to making this process work is having a short piece of DNA, called a primer, that will stick to the larger piece of DNA you want to copy, called a template. In this science project, you will test how the number of matches and mismatches in a primer will affect its ability to stick, or anneal, to the DNA template during PCR. Read more

Catalytic RNA and Structure

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Some sequences of RNA can catalyze biochemical reactions, much like protein enzymes. These catalytic RNA sequences are called ribozymes. The function of a ribozyme depends upon the primary sequence of the RNA which folds into a 3-D structure. How do different ribozyme sequences fold? You can search for ribozyme sequences using Entrez BLAST (NCBI, 2006). Then you can use a program like MFOLD (http://bioweb.pasteur.fr/seqanal/interfaces/mfold-simple.html) to submit your sequence for an… Read more

Liver Stinks!

STEM Activity

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Your liver is important for cleaning up any potentially dangerous substances you consume. But how does it do it?—With a little help from some complex chemistry. Within your liver, as within every tissue in the body, many chemical reactions occur. Often these reactions require "help" to happen at a faster speed, and this can be supplied by enzymes—tiny types of proteins. The liver uses specialized enzymes to help it break down toxic substances and make them safer for the… Read more

Molecular Scissors

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Ever used a pair of molecular scissors? Restriction enzymes are molecular scissors that cut DNA into pieces. Find out which enzymes will cut, and where by making a restriction map. Then you can figure out what will happen if you change the sequence of the DNA. Will the same enzymes still cut the new DNA sequence? Read more

No Whey! Milk Protein Content Doesn't Change...Or Does It?

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Many people you know probably have an opinion about the kind of milk they like to drink—some like it thin and refreshing, others like it thick and rich. Milk can be bought with different fat concentrations, but other than that, it's all the same. Or is it? This science fair project raises a few interesting questions about the other contents in milk. Do all milk products have the same protein concentrations? Do cows produce different types of milk during different stages of lactation?… Read more

Tenth Grade, Biotechnology Science Experiments (35 results)

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