| Explore | - Spider plants (Chlorophytum comosum) are perennial herbs that are to grow to 60cm high. - Often found in the variegated variety (usually Vittatum or Variegatum), though purely green spider plants also exist. - Able to thrive in a variety of abiotic factors; tolerates temperature down to 35 degrees Fahrenheit, with optimal conditions being 65-90 degrees Fahrenheit. - Has been noted to reduce indoor air pollution - Leaves of spider plants may begin to brown due to build up of salt due to fluoride in water supplies, though it is not detrimental to the health of the plant - Spiderettes, or tubers, may stem from mature spider plants when conditions may facilitate such an occurrence: usually during fall and winter. These spiderettes act as the offspring of spider-plants. - Spiderettes may be rooted and planted in soil as to grow a new spider plant To be candid, our choice to research spider plants may be primarily attributed due to a lack of Wisconsin Fast Plants as provided by our teacher. Despite this, our school had an abundance of spider plants, which provided us the opportunity to experiment on. The notion of spiderettes growing in such a manner was quite fascinating for us, which allured us into researching more about the plant. |
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| Research Question | What effect does humidity have on the growth of tuberous routes (spiderettes) of spider plants (Chlorophytum comosum)? |
| Predictions | There are three possible outcomes to our experiment: the plants' roots with the increased humidity will grow more than the plants with regular humidity; there will be no significant difference between the root growth of the increased humidity plants and regular humidity plants; the plants' roots with the regular humidity will grow more than the plants with the increased humidity. We think that the plants with the increased humidity will have increased root growth. Because of prior studies, we know that increased water will increase plant growth up to a certain point. We do not think that we have increased the humidity too much within the plastic bags, and thus the baby spider plants' roots will grow more with increased humidity. We do not think there will be a huge difference, but we do think the difference will be noticeable. |
| Experimental Design | Our plan is to test the effect of the relative humidity of the baby spider plants. The variable that we are testing is the relative humidity. We are going to have two levels of the independent variable: no enhanced humidity and enhanced humidity. In order to achieve these levels. we set up 12 bagged baby spider plants with no sponge and 12 bagged baby spider plants with a wet sponge. To clarify, the baby spider plants are not cut off from their adult plants, and the bags do not have soil in it. The wet sponges in clear plastic bags started by being soaked in 10 mL of water. Everyday we are going to add 1.5 mL to each bag with wet sponges for the 2 week period. The variables that we will measure and observe is average root length and number of roots. We will record the data by measuring the length in centimeters and counting the number of roots and organizing the numbers in data tables. These variables help us determine the overall root growth of the baby spider plants. Some variables that we will keep constant are the temperature of the bags, photo period, outside humidity, type of plastic bag, size of plastic bags, and outside temperature. |
| Investigation Theme | WOS |
| Grade Level | High School Students (Grades 9,10,11,12) |
| School Name | High Technology High School |
| Session | Fall 2017 |
| About this Project | This team did an excellent job with all aspects of our introduction to research project with planting science. I was especially impressed with their attention to detail with respect to data collection and the relatively large number of samples that they used in their study. The part that I most want to share with other students and educators was best summed up by their mentor, Johnathan, who messaged them, 'It makes me smile that you have stated that your prediction was wrong and that the plants with humidity may not grow as well as plants without humidity. You would be surprised how many people at every stage of a science career don't have the courage to say that their prediction was wrong.' |