Electrify Your Electrolytes: The Effect Drinks Have on Your Electrolytes

Student: William Black
Table: 7
Experimentation location: Home
Regulated Research (Form 1c): No
Project continuation (Form 7): No

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Abstract:

Electrolytes perform major functions for the body. One major function they perform is to balance the water in and outside the cells. This experiment was to find the drink that contained the highest amount of electrolytes. The results proved my hypothesis was correct; 1% milk contained the highest amount of electrolytes with an average of 51.1 microamps. Orange juice contained the second highest; average of 44.4 microamps.
This is because they are natural and better for you. Milk and orange juice had no additional additives. The sports drinks have a long list of ingredients and additives that are not from nature. In addition, the sport drinks contained yellow 5 dye (since I did lemon-lime sport drinks).

Bibliography/Citations:

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Project files
 

Research Plan:

 

In order to conduct this experiment, I needed to research electrolytes and the impact on your body after you workout, play a sport, sweat, or even get sick, and the impact to your body is that electrolytes are lost. Electrolytes need to be replaced to keep your body healthy and keep our cells healthy. One major function they perform is to balance the water in and outside the cells. Another major function is to allow muscles to move.  

My experiment required a way to test the number of electrolytes in a sample liquid to determine what would be the best way to replace electrolytes. We used a digital multimeter in order to get accurate readings. The digital multimeter measures the electrolytes in the liquid  because the electrolytes close the circuit, and sends a reading to the multimeter. The higher the reading the more electrolytes in the liquid.

 

Questions and Answers

1. What was the major objective of your project and what was your plan to achieve it? 

My objective was to determine what drink, would be the best source of electrolytes.

       a. Was that goal the result of any specific situation, experience, or problem you encountered? 

No, I wanted to see if after sports or workouts natural drinks were better than sports drinks.

       b. Were you trying to solve a problem, answer a question, or test a hypothesis?

My Hypothesis was that milk would provide the most electrolytes because of the vitamins it contains.

2. What were the major tasks you had to perform in order to complete your project?

       a. For teams, describe what each member worked on.

Researching electrolytes and the best test methods were the most important tasks.

3. What is new or novel about your project?

       a. Is there some aspect of your project's objective, or how you achieved it that you haven't done before?

       b. Is your project's objective, or the way you implemented it, different from anything you have seen?

       c. If you believe your work to be unique in some way, what research have you done to confirm that it is?

 

4. What was the most challenging part of completing your project?

Running multiple tests and reading the multimeter results was most challenging, since the numbers fluctuated.

      a. What problems did you encounter, and how did you overcome them?

Taking accurate readings.

      b. What did you learn from overcoming these problems?

I learned it was ok to repeat the experiment a few times to make sure the results were accurate.

5. If you were going to do this project again, are there any things you would you do differently the next time?

I would try chocolate milk and milk with different levels of fat (whole, 1%, etc.

6. Did working on this project give you any ideas for other projects?

I would like to work on sports drinks that could come from healthy sources.

7. How did COVID-19 affect the completion of your project?

I was only able to go to the store 1 time, so I had to be prepared with a detailed list of materials.