Algae Growth Lab Report

The purpose of this lab was to test the effect of pollution on algae growth. Through a series of experiments that lasted a month, four of the six hypotheses were proven to be correct or partially correct. The first hypothesis stated that if 0.5 mL of salt was added to algae, then the algae would grow slower than the positive control. This was proven correct, as shown by the difference of the data from the positive control and the container with 0.5 mL of salt in it. The end rating of the Salt #2 container was 1, which is not as high as the end rating for the positive control: 1.5. This was because salt cause the algae cells to pump water out of the cell into the hypertonic outside environment. As a result, the cell membranes inside the cell to shrivel and the cell to die. However, adding 0.5 mL of salt was probably not

This was proven partially correct, because the algae showed signs of greenness for two weeks after we added the pollutant, but began to die off in the third week of our experiment. Furthermore, the amount of algae seemed to decrease, which was very surprising. As a matter of fact, this also happened to several other containers of algae, such as Positive Control and Carbonated Beverage. The amount of algae seemed to decrease, which was strange because we never removed the algae from its container. The sixth hypothesis predicted that if a chunk of petroleum jelly was added to algae, the algae would grow slower than the positive control. This hypothesis was proven to be incorrect, as there seemed to be the most algae in the petroleum jelly container. Because the petroleum jelly simulated plastics, and plastics are generally understood to have a detrimental effect on nature, this result was unexpected. This was demonstrated by the ratings: at the end of our experiment, petroleum jelly had a rating of 4, while positive control had a rating of