Green Chemistry - Biofabric Activity

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Jennieb090
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Joined: Thu Apr 27, 2023 10:16 am
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Green Chemistry - Biofabric Activity

Post by Jennieb090 »

My middle school classes have been trying to make the biofabric following the procedure in your activity. It has not been very successful. We have not been able to get many of the dried materials to release from the material that we poured it into. We have also tried putting it on saran wrap over the fabric, using a fruit leather tray in a dehydrator, and finally in petri dishes. Petri dishes ended up being the most successful, but certainly did not look like the videos posted. Any suggestions as to what was going wrong? Is there anyone with actual results I can post to my students to make some conclusions from? We don't have enough data to really get much from the time and effort (other than overcoming frustration and the engineering process) that we put into this activity. Thank you.
AmyCowen
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Re: Green Chemistry - Biofabric Activity

Post by AmyCowen »

I am sorry to hear you and your students are having trouble with this project. This is the project you have been doing, correct: https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... biofabrics

This is a new project, recently tested and developed by one of our staff scientists. We don't share results because students using the projects (for independent student projects) need to be doing the procedure and gathering data directly.

I talked with our staff scientist about your post and have some troubleshooting input to pass on. She did note that in her testing, the fabric was often more likely to peel away while drying and shrink more than anticipated. She never experienced it sticking/not releasing.
  • You/students did spray the fabric with the calcium chloride solution? This is the most likely problem, so checking to make sure it was sprayed (the video also demonstrates this) and that the solution was correct, would be something to confirm.
  • What fabric did you use as the base? That can make a difference. It should be textured (but not waterproof).
  • * What recipe did you use? If you can walk through the specific recipe you used and the steps, we might have more insight into what happened.
If you want to share photos so we can view them along with the additional information you post, you can upload here (saved to a PDF), or you can email them to us at scibuddy@sciencebuddies.org

Amy
Science Buddies
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