Info
| Explore | Plants have leaves with which they photosynthesize sunlight. Inside those leaves are chlorophyll which converts sunlight into energy. Plants have roots with which they gather nutrients and water, which is transferred through their stems. Questions that interest us are how plants react to... |
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| Research Question | We want to study the effect of sound on plant growth. We came up with this question by first looking at the materials that were available and since we we're all interested in technology, we decided to pursue the effect of sound. We know a lot about technology and had previous done many... |
| Predictions | There are three possible outcomes given our experiment. The first, which we favor, is that a higher frequency will positively affect plant growth based on studies already made on different plants. There doesn't seem to be a general consensus on the reason of this. The second is that a lower... |
| Experimental Design | Our plan, as shown in our Experimental Design Diagram (saved in Files as a PDF under the name 'EDD'), is to have three test groups with each group having 12 trials. One will be subjected to 500 Hz, the second to no sound (control), and the third to 7,600 Hz. When the experiment is complete, we... |
| Conclusion | In the project results, the plants subjected to sound tones grew the tallest and had the most leaves on average. The plants grown in the 7600 hz tones had the highest averages for both, followed by the 500 hz ones and then the control with no sound. Our final paper detailing this is saved in... |
| About this Project |
Updates
Thanks Matt for being our mentor! We have concluded that there is a small gain in having the higher sound, but you would need a more controlled experiment to find a specific correlation. We have concluded that there really is no significant difference in having higher frequencies during plant growth.
Nice summary! This is a very good explanation of your results. I particularly like that it shows ideas for future experiments and that it translates what your results mean for other scientists!
Good job on the lab report! What are your goals/requirements for presenting your results? A written report, a poster, a presentation?
You may still be working on the report, but I'm curious to know what your results mean. As scientists, we have to answer some additional questions about our experiments (so that our work can help other scientists and give information about larger problems): How sure are you of your conclusions? Can you be sure that the plants your study accurately represent their species? Can you be sure that the plants you grew aren't a freak accident?
Answering these questions might be easier if you add the standard deviations that you calculated to your bar plots in excel (let me know if you want help with this, ask your teacher, or try google)- what do you think?
Hi everyone and happy Thanksgiving :). The lab report was actually due very quickly after our experiment was finished and the one we added here was the final one for our assignment and its report rubric. I'm not sure if there's going to be more to the assignment, like a small presentation or poster. If so, we may need to calculate standard deviations then, but they were not asked for in our final lab report. Thanks for all your help on the project Matt!
Yes, Happy Thanksgiving! Glad your report is all set then, and keep me posted if there are any other parts to this assignment. Thanks for being a great group to work with and thanks for doing great science research!
Okay now I'm uploading it. Long story but it's here now :)
I added our conclusions in the info section. Rohan should upload the full final paper shortly.
Never mind; Gustav's uploading it
I see the info section update and am excited for the paper itself! I'm particularly interested in the data figures.
As scientists, we have to answer some additional questions about our experiments (so that our work can help other scientists): How sure are you of your conclusions? Can you be sure that the plants your study accurately represent their species? Can you be sure that the plants you grew aren't a freak accident? To answer these questions, watch this video (especially the first minute): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRqtXL2WX2M
To calculate the Standard Deviation, you can use Microsoft Excel (as you already did for the mean). Type the following code into the cell where you want the Standard Deviation result
=STDEV(A1:Z99) (substitute the cell name of the first value in your dataset for A1, and the cell name of the last value for Z99.)
Let me know what you find! You can add the standard deviation to your plot in excel (let me know if you want help with this, ask your teacher, or try google) which will really help you interpret and present your results.
I uploaded pictures of the results. Here, we recorded the height in cm and leaf count. We're going to include a data table of all the trials, but also average them and graph them.
How are you averaging and graphing your data? Excel?
We're going to be using excel to input the data and make a second data table for the averages and then probably graph the averages in a bar graph to show the difference.
Today we finished the experiment and took the final height and leaf count of each plant. Gustav will post the results later.
Excellent! I see some discussion already about how you plan to analyze the results. What do you think are the benefits and drawbacks of grouping all trait data or plotting the traits separately?
The benefits of grouping all trait data is that we have a collective score for every plants but by plotting the traits separately is that all the information is shown, and we are going to plot the height and number of leaves separately.
We chose to make separate tables and graphs instead of scores so that the data is shown exactly how it occurred, not as determined scores.
Nice conclusions! Plotting them separately will allow you to see if both plant parts tell the same story or if the stories are different.
We have already collected our data and we don't think that counting flowers or seed pods is necessary because we have already have leaf counts. We also don't have enough time to wait for the seed pods to mature.
What do you think about counting the number of flowers or seed pods as well? It looks like you've already taken down the experiment, but perhaps this could be calculated from the images you have?
These are the final picture of the plants inside the foam structure and outside the foam structure.
Displaying IMG_2727.JPG
These are the 500 hertz plants.
I forgot to mention this but for some reason, our foam setup started to leak. Luckily, Gustav and I were there and we added a plastic wrap under the aluminum, so the water will stay put. Fortunately nothing was broken or affected by this problem.
We're planning on collecting the data on Wednesday. We're going to measure the height of each plant and the leaf count. We're thinking of adding those together to come up with a final score for each trial. They have begun flowering.
I don't think a 'score' is needed; we can just have two separate data types, tables, and graphs. The two can be different measures of the growth.
So on Wednesday, will we take apart the setup and end the experiment?
We think that our experiment will run for another week. We believe that the flowers will grow over the next week.
How much longer will your experiment run? What do you think about the flowers?
I uploaded the latest pictures of the plant growth before our school break on Thursday and Friday. Also, we need to add the team photo. Rohan, I think you have that on your phone.
Sorry for that display thing. These are some close ups of the WFP growing inside the foam structure. Most of them have germinated and are growing leaves.
Displaying IMG_2710.JPG
I uploaded some pictures of the full setup below. We also updated the project info to match our experiment and explain our research question and experimental design
Right now we do not have a standard measurement of the water. We pour some water in from the side, and keep pouring until the water makes a one centimeter puddle at the side. What this does is that the water travels sideways underneath the plants, so all the plants get watered at once.
We don't give each plant individually water, but they pull it up themselves and the water is always moist so it should be pretty standard since the same water is available to all of them
We put an tray made out of aluminum under our styrofoam container so that the watering could be easier. Since the bottom of the styrofoam container has holes the plants are able to suck up the water we pour in from the side.
Like Rohan said, it's not an exact measurement but we fill the foil tray until the water level is about one centimeter, which gives the plants enough water until we can water them again.
Great pictures! Have you standardized how much water you're giving?
We've worked out a schedule for watering the plants. I water them on monday and friday with Rohan. Justin waters them on thursday, gustav waters on tuesday, and Rohan also waters on wednesday.
We've been watering the plants every day (except for the weekend of course) and almost all of them have germinated. The sounds are playing and they seem pretty well insulated. When they get a bit higher, we'll try and measure their height.
The seeds were planted Tuesday and a few have germinated. They are being watered via a foil tray underneath that is refilled to allow the soil to soak up the water.
Thanks for the updates! Everything sounds good.
We found a journal article that explains that they found a relationship between higher tones and height in bean plants, but they didn't explain any reason and it doesn't seem like people have found a reason for this. We want to test this on Wisconsin Fast Plants and possibly propose a reason why this works once we gather more info.
We're almost done with creating the design and we will be planting today. We've made a chamber with the same light and water, separated with thick foam and with two speakers that will play a constant sound. We will make measurements periodically of the leaves and height.
Update: We actually didn't plant on Thursday; we were asked to wait until Monday so that we could watch the plants during their germination. Good luck with your surgery Matt!
We are going to start planting today with some of the other teams. Do you have any more suggestions or concerns for us?
I think things look good to start! I'm still trying to get to the bottom of your hypothesis before the plants grow, but that's more important for presenting your results. I may not be very active for the next few days, I will have surgery for a broken collarbone tomorrow.
I have added a few more constraints to the EDD. Do we have enough constraints, or are we missing some? If we are missing some, please specify which ones I missed.
Looks good! 1 question- why do you expect that Higher pitched sound tones will have a positive effect on the growth of Wisconsin Fast plants. ?
We expect that higher pitched sound tones will have a positive effect on the growth of Wisconsin Fast plants because there are more vibrations in higher pitched tones.
And how do vibrations affect plant growth?
Link to the EDD, probably complete:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nOF9VofvcFU9X1DozmHurhrBpw4VZ2BOi9g9d-EirKY/edit?usp=sharing
These ideas are coming together very nicely- would you be able to make a document of your protocol and upload it here? This should (1) help you when you are doing the experiment, (2) help us find trouble spots before you actually start the experiment, and (3) help you write up a final report/presentation.
Examples of things to put in this protocol- what your question is, what your experiment groups are, how many plants, how often to water, how long the experiment will run, what data you will measure, when you will measure data, etc.
We are working on an Experimental Design Diagram, which I believe should answer these questions and help find trouble spots.
Great- 12 seems like a good number- not too hard to take care of but enough so that random differences are minimized. By treatments, I mean any group other than the control. In this case, you have two groups with different sounds, so those are your two treatments.
We should be able to control for the styrafoam boxes by putting one over all three groups of plants (500 Hz, 15,000 Hz, and no sound) which should give them all equal effects if any from the box (possibly trapping some heat).
Excellent!