Outreach science labs aim to promote students' interest. Previous research has often suggested that performing experiments in such labs has a positive effect on their interest. However, these studies often lack a comparison to the effects of performing them at school. This research gap was addressed in the present study. The sample consisted of…

As e-commerce increases, the demand for packaging materials and the potential for generating waste and negative environmental impacts also rise. Packing peanuts are a type of plastic packaging material that are used to protect goods during the shipping process. Petroleum-based plastics are common packaging materials due to their low cost, light…

We created a 2-week, dual-module summer course introducing high school students to environmental toxicology by teaching them quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) as a way to quantify gene expression of chemical defense proteins in response to exposure to environmental pollutants. During the course, students are guided through the various…

Every day we deal with chemistry in various forms, but sometimes we don't see that. An example is biosensors that help us to evaluate health conditions, monitor environmental pollution and ensure food freshness. The most well known (and most widely sold) is the biosensor for blood glucose measurement, used every day by people with diabetes.…

The high level of consumption of processed foods has an effect on human health. The consumption of doughnuts, pastries, fried chicken, French fried potatoes, snack chips, and imitation cheese is high among teenagers. These foods are generally rich in fats, although the focus has often been on the quantity rather than the quality of these fats.…

Digestion is a fundamentally important process for an individual's life. However, the physical process of digestion is hidden inside the body, making it challenging to understand and a particularly difficult topic for students to learn in the classroom. Traditional approaches to teaching body processes include a mixture of textbook teaching and…

A signature of life is that biological molecules occur as a single stereoisomer with respect to each chiral center, and this is echoed in the structures of biological polymers. Thus, circular dichroism (CD) has emerged as a hallmark of biomolecular structures. The tangible and familiar phenomenon of raw egg white's conversion from transparent…

Proteins are involved in nearly every biological process, which makes them of interest to a range of scientists. Previous work has shown that hand-held cameras can be used to determine the concentration of colored analytes in solution, and this paper extends the approach to reactions involving a color change in order to quantify protein…

A laboratory exercise was devised that allows students to rapidly and fairly accurately determine the iodine value of oleic acid. This method utilizes the addition of elemental bromine to the unsaturated bonds in oleic acid, due to bromine's relatively fast reaction rate compared to that of the traditional Wijs solution method. This method also…

The physical and chemical properties of Milk of Magnesia provide examples of chemical concepts and opportunities for investigative practical work for secondary chemistry students of all ages. Basing the lesson on the contents of that familiar blue bottle, which is probably lurking somewhere in a cupboard in most households, also showcases the role…

Since the first report of electroformed micrometer-sized liposomes in the 1980s, giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) have generated a lot of interest in the biophysical and biochemical communities. However, their penetration rate in high school or at the undergraduate level is still limited because of the requirement of specialized materials for…

Plants and plant products are key to the survival of life on earth. Despite this fact, the significance of plant biochemistry is often underrepresented in science curricula. We designed an innovative laboratory activity to engage students in learning about the biochemical properties of natural polymers produced by plants. The focus of the hands-on…

"Catalase," an enzyme found in both plant and animal cells, prevents the accumulation of toxic levels of hydrogen peroxide (H[subscript 2]O[subscript 2]) by catalyzing its decomposition to water and oxygen gas. Because this enzyme is ubiquitous, it is frequently used in high school biology laboratories to explore enzyme reactions. This…

Although research and new technologies have introduced different ways of observing microorganisms, including scanning and electron microscopy, these methods are expensive and require equipment that is typically not found in a middle school classroom. The transmission-through-dye technique (TTD; Gregg et al., 2010), a new optical microscopy method…

Allelopathy plays crucial roles in invasive plant viability and agricultural production systems. However, there is no well-established hands-on learning activity to teach the concept of allelopathy. Nor is there an activity which allows students to gain knowledge about glucosinolates and their corresponding enzyme, myrosinase, which are present in…