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Dirt Dwellers

Project by group dmsstiemspring2021


Info

Explore All seeds contain a diploid embryo and a food supply. The diploid embryo contains the root, the stem, and the leaf, which are called cotyledons. Most of the seeds have a shell that is called a seed coat. Dicots (plants with two cotyledons) store their energy reserves in their leaves. Monocots...
Research Question How does the type of liquid affect the germination of the seed?
Predictions If we change the liquid, then water will do the best while the alcohol in the hand sanitizer will kill the seed. This is because the water is the thing that a plant needs to grow and the alcohol in the hand sanitizer will kill the seed.
Experimental Design Control: Amount of light, water, and temperature of water and area Independent Variable: Type of liquid Dependent Variable: Growth of plant at the end of a week. 1. Collect materials. Materials: 50 buckwheat seeds, 5 paper towels, 5 plastic bags, beef broth, carbonated water, water, hand...
Conclusion Claim: Watering seeds with Carbonated water makes them grow better. Evidence: Carbonated water had a average measurement of 6.9 centimeters. Hand Sanitizer grew the worst, heck it didn’t even grow at all. Apple juice was second worse with beef broth being second best. Water didn’t have a...
About this Project

They're quite structured in collecting and presenting data and can also be creative by showing their data under different perspectives.
-- Marina Borges Osorio, Scientist Liaison

Updates

Get to know your team’s scientist mentor, who will encourage and guide you through the scientific process of discovery. The more you share your ideas and research info, the more your mentor can help. You may also hear from a scientist mentor liaison who will be helping all the teams in your class.
PlantingScience Staff
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PlantingScience Staff
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PlantingScience Staff
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Erich Huebner
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Erich Huebner
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Erich Huebner
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PlantingScience Staff
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PlantingScience Staff
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PlantingScience Staff
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Bucky
said

Evaluation:

Dylan couldn’t measure the seed because they were all tangled. This soiled the experiment because without a proper measurement from Water we can't really solve the question. In the future we can spread the seeds farther from each other so there is little chance of them getting tangled,

Tim, apple juice, saw many types of mold in his bag of seeds. This might have been because the sugar in the juice had fermented, or because he forgot to wash his hands before handling the seeds. This killed or stunted the growth of a few of the seeds and left our findings maybe a bit wrong. To prevent this in the future we can keep human contact with seeds to a minimum, to reduce the amount of bacteria that gets on the seed.

I didn’t water my seeds every day, for I saw that my bag was still wet even after a few days, maybe my measurements of 5 ml were accidentally 5 cl, but to make sure this doesn’t happen next time, we can double check our measurements and measurement devices respectively. 

I am somewhat confident in this investigation because we conducted ten trials and used scientific principles and concepts, but the attempts of error we considered were not the same as the errors we faced. We thought we had accounted for every problem, but we didn’t consider the idea of mold getting into the seed containment bags. If we could have prevented this, our results might have been more correct. We used ten seeds, just incase a few died. At least 1 died in each, this was expected but we didn’t know that mold could spread between seeds so fast. We tried to clean out the mold and Tim changed the apple juice paper towels daily, but the mold still spread and plant lives were still lost.

    Marina Borges Osorio
    said

    Dear Bucky,

    It is great that you managed to identify the drawbacks faced during the experiment!

    Of course, tangled roots make length measurement more difficult. These days scientists do these analyses through softwares using photos or scans of seedlings each day after sowing seeds. These programs can measure things in every direction, so it's easy even if the root does a loop!

    Regarding mold, that's a pretty normal issue plant biologists have to deal with every day...but obviously, you could not see it coming because it's your first experience with this type of experiment.

    So great work guys, the most important is that you learn from these drawbacks and are able to apply what you've learned in future experiments :)

    I hope you've had a fun session and best luck with the rest of your school year!

    Marina (liaison)

Nora Mitchell
said

Hm, I would say to think about how you could have measured the control roots, or another way of measuring the roots where it would not matter if they were tangled. In some of the graphs "length of the seed" is a little confusing - is it just length of the roots? Maybe mass (weight) of the seedling could have been measured, that way the tangling would not have mattered? Really interesting results here, great work everyone!

    Tim
    said

    Thanks!

Nora Mitchell
said

These graphs look exciting! Do you have total growth for the controls as well? I cannot read the full conclusions...

    Tim
    said

    We don't have the total growth for the control because we couldn't measure the length of the roots because they were tangled. We also don't have any data for the control before the final day. 

    Kristen Stiem
    said

    Hi Nora! I believe you can read the full conclusion if you click on the "info" tab! I hope this helps!

PlantingScience Staff
said

Farewell and Best Wishes

As this research project is now in the final stages of wrapping-up, we wish to thank everyone who participated in this inquiry; the students, mentors, teachers and others behind the scenes. We appreciate all of your efforts and contributions to this online learning community.

Scientific exploration is a process of discovery that can be fun! There are many unanswered questions about plants just waiting for new scientists to consider, investigate, and share.

After the end of the session, we will be updating the platform and archiving groups and projects, after which time new updates/posts will not be able to be added to projects or groups. You have until Tuesday, April 25, 2021, to post ALL of your updates, comments, and goodbyes. Please come back and visit the PlantingScience Project Gallery anytime to view this project in the future. You can search the Gallery by keyword, team name, topic, or school name.

Good bye for now.

Warm regards,

The PlantingScience Team

Landon F
said

thank you for helping us

Tim
said

Do you have any feedback for the experiment? what should we have done differently? 

Dylan
said

Thank you for helping with everything!

Bucky
said

Anyway, thanks for all your help! 

Bucky
said

Can you reveiw our conclusion Mentor?

Bucky
updated the project info
Tim
said

Thank you for your help and involvement in this project!

Tim
updated the project info
Landon F
uploaded the total groth of seeds watered with differnt liquids.png in project files
Tim
uploaded Type of liquid vs. Total growth 1.png in project files
Bucky
uploaded How do different kinds of liquid affect the length of a seed_.png in project files
Dylan
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Nora Mitchell
said

Exciting results coming in! Looks like none of the seeds in the hand sanitizer treatment have germinated yet - is this true?

    Tim
    said

    Yes it is.

Bucky
said

my seeds had no mold! but one of them did not sprout 

 

 

Nora Mitchell
said

Interesting that there were so many types of mold - where did you get these seeds? 

    Tim
    said

    We got these seeds from our teacher. For me, one possible source of error could be that the bag wasn't completely closed the entire time. 

Tim
updated Planting Science_ Dirt Dwellers Data Collection.pdf in project files
Dylan
said

My seeds were getting very close to shedding their seed covers and exposing the first leaves to the sunlight. They roots never got very brown, and all of the plants looked healthy except for the moldy one.

Tim
said

In the end, I had at least 4 different varieties of mold in my bag. I had some fluffy white, grayish-green, bright yellow, and a red/orange. Earlier I also had a grayish-white. I think that I had waaaay too much fun describing my mold. 

Landon F
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Landon F
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Landon F
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Dylan
uploaded Planting Science_ Dirt Dwellers Data Collection.pdf in project files
Bucky
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Dylan
said

Hi, 
So I yesterday I saw that one of my seeds was molded over at the opening where the root was trying to come out, and I'm a little confused because the two seeds on either side of the molding one are growing. The bag's only been opened to water, so there's little chance of bacteria getting in, and the water came from the tap. Do you think it was just a bad seed?

    Nora Mitchell
    said

    The seed could have had some spores on it, that's okay though! That's why it's good to have multiple seeds per treatmetn!

Nora Mitchell
said

Oh the pictures look great! Are you recording data? Where do you think the mold came from - the liquid, the seed, or some other source?

    Tim
    said

    I think that they came from the liquid and/or some other source. We are recording our data.

Colin
uploaded IMG_1908.jpg in project files
Tim
said

My paper towel became moldy probably because my paper towel was soaked. 

Colin
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Bucky
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Nora Mitchell
said

The pictures look great - so exciting! How often will you re-apply the different liquids?

    Dylan
    said

    Once a day, during class.

Colin
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Nora Mitchell
said

That sounds great - what other different types of liquids will you test?

    Tim
    said

    We are using beef broth, apple juice, carbonated water, and hand sanitizer. With the beef broth, I think that that it might help it grow better because it would have some nutrients that might help its growth. With apple juice, it has sugar that also might help its growth. carbonated water has carbon which might help the plant photosynthesize. Hand sanitizer, I'm not sure. I think we are just going to see what happens to the seeds that get watered with it. 

Tim
updated the project info
Tim
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Tim
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Bucky
updated the project info
Tim
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