Vitamin C in the body and an experiment to measure Vitamin C in cabbage.

Osteoarthritis is a form of arthritis where the amount of water in the Cartilage in the joints decreases causing the cologne level in the cartilage to decrease this makes the Cartilage less resilient to the everyday wear and tear that the moment of the joint causes making movement of the join painful and causing stiffness of the joints, vitamin C can help ease the symptoms of Osteoarthritis because it plays a vital role in the formation of new cologne in the body

Vitamin C deficiency can cause heart disease because the body uses vitamin C to maintain the walls of the blood vessels leading into the heart and without the vitamin C to maintain the walls of the blood vessels the blood can’t get to the heart to be pumped around to body or be pumped to the heart to provide oxygenated blood for the heart muscle to use.  

The titration Procedure

We had to find how much vitamin C was in cabbage and how the cooking process affected the level of the vitamin C, we used titration to find out how much vitamin C was in the cabbage. Titration is a process that is used to find the concentration of acid, in this example it is ascorbic, acid ascorbic acid is also known as vitamin C. The acid reacts with the indicator (DCPIP) when it was neutralised the indicator turns from blue to a pink.

Method

We took 5g of the cabbage and ground it in a pestle and mortar with sand and ethanoic acid. We then took the mixture and filtered it through filter paper into a beaker. We then measured 10ml of the cabbage mixture and mixed it with 90ml of water, we then put this into a burette and added it to 1ml of DCPIP until the DCPIP turned from blue to pink, when it turned pink we stopped and measured how much of the liquid that was in the burette was left. We did this process for the 3 different types of cabbage    

Risk assessments:

Hazards

 

1. Ethanoic acid
2. Beaker
3. Burette
4. DCPIP
5. sand
6. cabbage
7. Stand
8. pestle and mortar

Risks

1. If the Ethanoic acid gets in your eye it could permanently blind you or damage your eyes.
2. if the beaker smashed you could cut yourself and it could get infected because of the bacteria on the glass
3. If the burette smashed you could cut yourself and it could get infected because of the bacteria on the glass
4. If the DCPIP gets in your eye it could damage your eye sight.
5. If the sand gets blown into your eye it could scratch your eye ball
6. If you are allergic to cabbage you could get a rash or your throat could swell up and your might no be able to breath.
7. If the stand falls on your head it could seriously hurt you
8. if you grind your finger you could break your finger

Control measures

 

1. To prevent the acid splashing and going in your eyes you could use less acid used in the pestle and mortar or you could wear goggles to protect your eyes
2. To stop yourself injuring yourself on the glass you could use shatter resistant glass in the experiment or you could wear gloves to protect your hands from the glass
3. To stop yourself injuring yourself on the burette you could use shatter resistant glass in the experiment or you could wear gloves to protect your hands from the glass
4. to stop the DCPIP getting in your eye you could wear goggles to block it from getting in your eye
5. you could wear goggles to block the sand getting blown into your eye
6. if you are so allergic to cabbage you cant be in the same room as if you could wear a full body suit to protect yourself but if you only get a allergic reaction to it from touch you could use tweezers to move the cabbage
7. You could wear a hard hat to protect your head from the stand falling on it and injuring it.
8. You could use a machine to grind the cabbage instead of the pestle and mortar.

Results table  

These results show me that raw cabbage is high in vitamin C because it took less DCPIP to turn the mixture pink. Whilst we added the cabbage mixture to the DCPIP we saw it turn from blue to pink, this was the end point of the experiment. Eye site is a factor in the experiment because some people won’t have as good eyesight as others so some might be able to detect the mixture turning pink where as others will be able to. Also colour blind people might not be able to tell the difference between the blue at the start and the pink at the end.

Out of the 3 types of cabbage we used, raw, steamed and boiled the raw cabbage, our experiment showed that the raw cabbage had the most vitamin C, this is because it is its natural state and it’s naturally high in vitamin C.

The steamed cabbage came second over all, this is because the steaming method of cooking isn’t as

Our experiment showed us that the boiled cabbage had the lest vitamin C in it out of the three types of cabbage we tested, this is because vitamin C isn’t heat soluble and the cabbage is cooked in boiling water.

Overall I think the experiment we did was good because I think we preformed it correctly, sensibly and safely. If I was to do it again I wouldn’t change anything. I think that the results are accurate enough to give a firm conclusion that raw cabbage has the most vitamin C in.