• Question: what was your weirdest experiment

    Asked by zeter :) to Alan, Becky, Jo, Sankar, Sarah on 9 Mar 2015.
    • Photo: Jo Sadler

      Jo Sadler answered on 9 Mar 2015:

      Some of the biology experiments I do are quite wierd. When you use bacteria to make enzymes you have to grow up a culture of bacteria, trigger them to start making your protein, then extract out the protein at the end. As you’re doing it you get a (for want of a better description) snot like consistency of cells that you have to stir around in a pot! There is another experiment I sometimes do to extract DNA which goes through a stage of looking like cottage cheese..!

    • Photo: Alan McCue

      Alan McCue answered on 9 Mar 2015:

      There is a really interesting experiment that I have done (for fun) where you drop a piece of burning magnesium metal into a glass of water and it keep on burning! I think this is amazing because normally water would put the fire out!

    • Photo: Sarah Kirk

      Sarah Kirk answered on 10 Mar 2015:

      I find it weird when an experiment hasn’t worked and I can’t figure out why. Of course, there is always a reason why, but sometimes it is very difficult to understand. Sometimes I’ll be making something that I expect to be a solid, and it’ll end up as a gloop instead, which is very difficult to handle!

    • Photo: Becky Gregory

      Becky Gregory answered on 11 Mar 2015:

      I have been trying to make some solid chitin (the chemical found in the shells of insects and prawns and other creatures) more soluble so that it can be used in a sort of liquid form. To do this I have been sonicating it in acid (sonicating is high pitched sound waves that cause strong vibrations and cause things to break apart). The first time I tried it I was surprised that the consistency I obtained was very jelly-like! I thought it might turn into Flubber or something!

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