Amanda Onopa’s Introduction and Conclusion to the Titration Lab
Introduction
Acids and bases are found everywhere in households; food, cleaning supplies,
even hair products. They are important agents to use in making foods taste bitter or sour,
and food scientists have to take precision of pH into consideration when developing
products for the publics taste. Analytical experiments can also be done for research on
equivalence points and Ka’s for acids. For the titration lab, procedure called to neutralize
an acidic unknown by adding amounts of base until the equivalence point was reached for
the solution (when it turned faintly pink). By adding a strong base to a weak acid
unknown, the acid can be identified through calculating pH at various amounts of NaOH
at the equivalence points.
Conclusion
In the titration lab, balance of pH had to be made and identify an unknown acidic
component by adding selected amounts of .1 M NaOH, a strong base. By calculating at
what pH level and amount (in milliliters) of the base added, one could figure out what the
acid was through these amounts and equivalence points. The acid was lemon juice,
H3C6H5O7. By taking away the H+ by adding basic OH-, the equivalence point was
approached. The equivalence point was reached once the solution turned pink due to the
indicator phenolphthalein. The average pH this point was reached at was 8.87. The
average final amount of mL NaOH added at equivalence point varied due to switching to
a lesser amount of a diluted acid on the second day of lab.