Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

So I want to do an experiment on the effectiveness of home remedies on lowering cholesterol. I found that someone did this at a science fair and used the following materials:

Materials: Five 300 mL glassware, five 1000 mL beaker, five hot plates, warm-water bath, five thermometers, timer, dissection tray, digital scale, general lab equipment.

Description: The home remedies for lowering cholesterol that are investigated are coriander juice, honey-garlic paste, and apple cider vinegar. Those different remedies are applied on pig fat and its resulting mass reduction after each treatment will be recorded and compared.

I clicked on the link that is supposed to show the project, however it isnt working and I have no idea how they conducted this experiment with the materials listed. Can anyone PLEASE help guide me on how to do this? Feel free to suggest methods that don't include these materials.

THANKSS

Hi Natasha,

Thanks for posting your interesting question on Scibuddies. I will try to help you with planning a project in this area and designing appropriate experiments to test a hypothesis.

First off, let me say that I am not familiar with this specific science fair demonstration, but I get the idea from your description. However, as a research scientist and lab rat myself, I have to say that these experiments will not tell you anything about the effects of your test compounds on cholesterol. Pork fat (lard) does contain some cholesterol (95 mg per 100 g of lard, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lard) but it is 99.9% fat. So, the experiments you read about really are showing an effect of these 'home remedies' on fat, not cholesterol.

Too much saturated fat in the diet has been linked to heart disease and cancer, so reducing it or neutralizing its effects could be beneficial. If you wanted to approach the project by asking if coriander juice, honey-garlic or apple cider vinegar might help to break down saturated fats, that would be OK, I think. You would need to do some reading online about this, however, and try to find out if adding these substances to food could help neutralize the bad effects of lard. Be careful where you get your 'facts', however, as the web is full of misinformation, especially with regard to diet and health.

Let me know what you would like to do in view of what I said and I can help you to come up with a workable hypothesis and some valid experiments to test it.

Best wishes,
Sybee