Table of Contents
Purpose
1
Hypothesis
Experimental Design
1
2
Materials Used
3
Procedures
4
Research Report
5
Results
10
➔ Trial #1
10
➔ Trial #2
11
➔ Trial #3
12
➔ Trial #1-3 Results Explanation
13
Conclusion
14
Next Time
15
Bibliography
16
1
Purpose
The purpose of this experiment is to figure out how sugar water can affect the process of
osmosis in gummy bears. It is also an experiment to learn more about osmosis and understand
how it works with sugar water. Osmosis is a method that can be applied to the real-world.
Osmosis takes place in the human body cells daily, it takes place in plant cells to transport water
from the roots to the leaves, it’s used to store red blood cells for future use, it can be used to
preserve fruits and meats and it can also be used as a distillation method in order to create
drinkable water for places in the world that are in need of water. Since osmosis is a method that
can benefit the world in many ways, knowing how osmosis works with sugar-water can be
significant.
Hypothesis
It can be predicted that, if the gummy bears are placed in both the regular water solution
and sugar-water solution then the gummy bears in the regular water solution will expand more
than the gummy bears in the sugar-water solution. During osmosis, the molecules of water move
from high concentration to low concentration through the semipermeable membrane to create
balance. The regular water solution will be less saturated than the gummy bears and since the
gummy bears don't have water molecules inside, the sugar molecules won’t be able to go through
the semipermeable membrane which will cause the water molecules from the regular water
solution to go through the semipermeable membrane into the gummy bears in order to try and
make the proportion of sugar molecules to water the same in both places. The sugar-water
solution will have sugar dissolved in the solution which will make it less likely that the water
travels through the semipermeable membrane into the gummy bear. Even if the water molecules
do travel through the semipermeable membrane into the gummy bear it still won't be able to
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expand more than the gummy bear in the regular water solution due to the higher concentration
in the sugar-water solution.
Experimental design
The gummy bear osmosis experiment conducted on this report contains a control group
and an experimental group. The experimental group consists of the gummy bear in the sugarwater solution because it is what’s being tested. Since the purpose of the experiment is to see the
effect that sugar water has on the osmosis process, it is also the experimental group. It is being
tested because it has a testing variable which is the solute(salt). The control group would be the
gummy bear in the regular water solution because it does not receive the test variable. It’s not the
group that will help answer the question that is asked in this experiment.
The experiment also contains an independent variable, a dependent variable and constants. The
independent variable is the solute, which in this experiment is the sugar that was added to the
water to make sugar-water. The dependent variable is the length and the mass of the gummy
bears because these factors depend on the solution that they are placed in. The length and the
mass of the gummy bears is the variable that’s being tested which makes it the dependent
variable. The constants for this experiment consist of the following:
★ The amount of water in each of the cups
★ The amount of time the gummy bears will be in the solutions
★ The same brand of gummy bears
The length of the gummy bears will be measured in centimeters(cm). The mass of the gummy
bears will be measured in grams(g). The amount of water in each cup will be measured in
milliliters(ml). The amount of time the gummy bears stay in the solutions will be measured in
hours. The amount of solute(salt) added to the solution is going to be measured in grams(g).
3
The gummy bears mass and length will be tested for after 12 hours, 24 hours and 36 hours in 1
trial. There will be 3 trials in total. The data will be recorded in 3 separate data tables for the 3
trials.
Materials Used
Materials
Amount
Ruler
1
Plastic Cups(500ml)
18
Gummy Bears
18 pieces
Beaker(500ml)
1
Teaspoon
1
Sugar
18g
Permanent Marker
1
Water
3,600ml
Electronic Kitchen Scale
1
Napkins
9
Timer
3
4
Procedures
1) Take 6 plastic cups and label 3 of them “regular water solution”. Label the other 3 plastic
cups “sugar-water solution” with a permanent marker
2) Add 200 ml of water to each of the 6 cups. Measure 200 ml of water using a beaker
3) Add 2 grams of sugar to the 3 cups labeled “sugar-water solution” to make a sugar-water
solution. Measure 2 grams of sugar using the electric kitchen scale and a teaspoon
4) Add a gummy bear to each of the 6 cups (You can color coordinate the gummy bears so
that the sugar-water solution has the same colored gummy bears and regular water
solution has the same colored gummy bears. Ex: red gummy bear-->sugar-water solution,
yellow gummy bear-->regular water solution.)
5) Start the timers. Set the first timer for 12 hours, the second timer for 36 hours and the
third timer for 48 hours
6) Leave 1 “sugar-water solution” cup gummy bear and 1 “regular water solution” cup
gummy bear in the solution for 12 hours.
7) After 12 hours take out the gummy bears from the solution and record the weight and
length of the gummy bears in a data table
8) Compare the weight and length of the 2 gummy bears to the original weight and length of
a gummy bear using a electronic kitchen scale(grams) and a ruler(cm) and record the
difference in a data table.
9) Repeat steps 5-7 for 24 hours and 36 hours using the timers and the 2 “regular water
solution” cup gummy bears and the 2 “sugar-water solution” cup gummy bears that you
already set up. Make sure you record all your data on a data chart.
10) Repeat all the steps above 2 more times in order to get 3 trials done. Make sure you have
at least 3 trials. Record your data for the 3 trials on 3 seperate data charts.
5
Research Report
Reverse Osmosis and If it Can be Used to get Drinkable Clean Water
Have you ever wondered how clean water can be created from dirty water using science?
If you have then osmosis is the answer to your question. Over the past years, scientists have been
researching and making changes in osmosis, which is a process by which molecules of a solvent
tend to pass through a semipermeable membrane from a less concentrated solution into a more
concentrated one. The concept of osmosis has been applied to water filtration through years of
research which resulted in reverse osmosis. Reverse osmosis units force water through a
semipermeable membrane under pressure, leaving contaminants behind. (Water Health Series
Filtration Facts, 6) This process allows poisonous or polluting substances to leave from impure
water, leaving only drinkable and healthy water for people to use. Reverse osmosis is very useful
because its effective in cleaning impure water and has a lot of advantages to it but the efficiency
of the procedure of reverse osmosis still needs to be improved considering the fact that there are
also a lot of disadvantages related to the process of reverse osmosis and reverse osmosis treated
water is not completely safe be used daily .
To begin, reverse osmosis is a very efficient process for detoxifying impure water. RO
can typically remove 80 to 99 percent of most mineral contaminants. (New Hampshire
Department of Environmental Services, 2) Reverse osmosis can remove almost all the toxins
from impure water. The treated water quality of this process of filtration is very effective. For
example, if the concentration of contaminants in the raw water was 1.0 milligram per liter
(mg/L) and the efficiency of the treatment device was 90 percent for that contaminant; the
treated water contaminant concentration would be approximately 0.1 mg/L.(New Hampshire
Department of Environmental Services, 2)This filter has a pore size of around 0.0001 micron.
Therefore, due to its pore size it can remove things such as protozoa, bacteria, viruses and
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common chemical contaminants from impure water. RO has been used increasingly in making
processed water for dialysis in hospitals and for certain cosmetics and drugs by pharmaceutical
manufacturers. In addition to these applications, RO is capable of producing water of sufficient
purity to be used as Water For Injection (WFI) and for the preparation of parenteral solutions
(U.S Food & Drug Administration, 1). By looking at how water produced by reverse osmosis is
used by the community it can be interpreted that the quality of the water produced by reverse
osmosis is very sufficient. This supports the idea that reverse osmosis is an efficient way to get
good quality water from impure water.
To add on to this, there are even more advantages to the process of reverse osmosis.
Some examples are that the processing system is simple; the only complicating factor is finding
or producing a clean supply of feedwater to minimize the need for frequent cleaning of the
membrane, RO technologies can make use of an almost unlimited and reliable water source, the
sea, RO technologies can be used to remove organic and inorganic contaminants, and the
technology makes minimal use of chemicals.(2.1 Desalination by reverse osmosis,1) These
factors make the system very efficient and useful considering the fact that this process can use
sea water as feedwater and makes the water useful.
However, there are also some disadvantages for using the process of reverse osmosis.
Although it is very efficient in detoxifying the impure water, reverse osmosis uses up a lot of
water to finish it`s process. Reverse osmosis units use approximately three times as much water
as they treat.(Water Health Series Filtration Facts, 6) Due to this the reverse osmosis process in
inefficient in treating small amounts of water because it will use up most of the water for the
process and leave you with even smaller amounts of pure water. For example, assuming the
volumetric efficiency of an RO treatment device was 25 percent, if 10 gallons of raw water is fed
into the device daily, only 2.5 gallons of water will migrate through the membrane to become
7
treated pure water.(New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services, 2) This example
provides a way for people to understand how inefficient this process is in terms of how much
treated water it produces.
Another disadvantage for using reverse osmosis would be the fouling of the membrane.
This is when the membrane of reverse osmosis units gets dirty by all the polluted chemicals
stuck in the membrane. This impacts the treated water by making it less pure. Fouling of the
membrane must be avoided in order to get fresh water using the process of reverse osmosis. In
general, the recovery efficiency of RO desalination plants increases with time as long as there is
no fouling of the membrane.(2.1 Desalination by reverse osmosis,1) Therefore, it is very
important that the membrane must be kept clean in order to get good results from the reverse
osmosis method. Although it is important to avoid fouling of the membrane, there have been
developments in the membrane of the reverse osmosis unit that makes the membrane less
vulnerable to fouling and so these newly developed membranes can be used to prevent
membrane fouling.
Furthermore, there are also many other disadvantages included with reverse osmosis. For
example there is a risk of bacterial contamination of the membranes; while bacteria are retained
in the brine stream, bacterial growth on the membrane itself can introduce tastes and odors into
the product water, the membranes are sensitive to abuse, the feedwater usually needs to be
pretreated to remove particulates (in order to prolong membrane life), operation of a RO plant
requires a high quality standard for materials and equipment, brine must be carefully disposed of
to avoid deleterious environmental impacts, and RO technologies require a reliable energy
source.(2.1 Desalination by reverse osmosis,1) These factors make the reverse osmosis system
difficult to manage. However, the risk of most of these factors have been reduced due to the new
developments in reverse osmosis.
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Adding on to this, water treated by reverse osmosis is not safe to use for daily activities
such as drinking and cooking. Water in its purest form devoid of natural minerals can also be the
other end of spectrum where health could be adversely affected.(K.C. Verma and A.S. Kushwaha,
1) The fact that reverse osmosis treated water contains very little amount of calcium and
magnesium which is very significant for the human body to be able to function properly it isn't
healthy to drink or use for cooking considering the effects it has on vegetables and meats .
Demineralized soft water, when used for cooking is known to cause substantial losses of all
essential elements from food (vegetables, meat, cereals). Such losses may reach up to 60% for
magnesium and calcium or even more for some other microelements (e.g., copper 66%, manganese
70%, cobalt 86%). (K.C. Verma and A.S. Kushwaha, 1) This is having a negative impact on the
human body considering the fact that humans consume most nutrients from food. Since most
nutrients are ingested with food, the use of low-mineral water for cooking and processing food
may cause a marked deficiency in total intake of some essential elements that was much higher
than expected with the use of such water for drinking only.(K.C. Verma and A.S. Kushwaha, 1)
Therefore, it isn't safe to use reverse osmosis treated water for cooking and it's better to use hard
water to cook.
Furthermore, reverse osmosis treated water can cause disorders in the human body if
consumed by people. Recent studies also suggest that the intake of soft water, i.e. water low in
calcium, may be associated with higher risk of fracture in children, certain neurodegenerative
diseases, pre-term birth and low weight at birth and some types of cancer. In addition to an
increased risk of sudden death, the intake of water low in magnesium seems to be associated
with a higher risk of motor neuronal disease, pregnancy disorders (so-called preeclampsia) and
some types of cancer.(K.C. Verma and A.S. Kushwaha, 1) Due to these factors it isn't safe to
drink reverse osmosis treated water considering the fact that consuming the treated water can
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lead to the development of the listed diseases and birth defects. It's the best choice to regularly
take in hard water to keep the human body healthier. Expert Consensus Meeting Group Report
on potential health consequences of long-term consumption of demineralized, remineralized and
altered mineral content drinking water has concluded that the hypothesis that consumption of
hard water is associated with a somewhat lowered risk of cardiovascular disease was probably
valid, and that magnesium was the more likely contributor of that benefits. (K.C. Verma and
A.S. Kushwaha, 1) Therefore, it is better and healthier to consume hard water instead of reverse
osmosis treated water.
To sum it all up, reverse osmosis is a method to get clean water which has some
advantages and disadvantages to it. It is an efficient way to get good quality clean water from
impure water but even though that's true it is still very hard to manage this process due to its
membrane which is vulnerable to fouling. Although reverse osmosis treated water is used for a
lot of things in an efficient way, it is still unsafe to use for daily activities that include drinking
and cooking since it can lead to health problems and nutrient deficiency. Overall, reverse
osmosis is not a method that can be used to get drinkable water.
10
Results
Trial#1:
Time
Solution
Initial
mass(g)
After mass(g)
Initial
length(cm)
After
length(cm)
12 hours
Regular water
2g
6g
2cm
4cm
12 hours
Sugar-water
2g
5g
2cm
4.5cm
24 hours
Regular water
2g
8g
2cm
4.5cm
24 hours
Sugar-water
2g
8g
2cm
4cm
36 hours
Regular water
2g
12g
2cm
6cm
36 hours
Sugar water
2g
11g
2cm
5cm
11
Trial#2:
Time
Solution
Initial
mass(g)
After mass(g)
Initial
length(cm)
After
length(cm)
12 hours
Regular water
2g
8g
2cm
4.5cm
12 hours
Sugar-water
2g
6g
2cm
3.5cm
24 hours
Regular water
2g
7g
2cm
4.5cm
24 hours
Sugar-water
2g
7g
2cm
4cm
36 hours
Regular water
2g
10g
2cm
5.5cm
36 hours
Sugar water
2g
9g
2cm
6cm
12
Trial#3:
Time
Solution
Initial
mass(g)
After mass(g)
Initial
length(cm)
After
length(cm)
12 hours
Regular water
2g
7g
2cm
4cm
12 hours
Sugar-water
2g
5g
2cm
3.5cm
24 hours
Regular water
2g
8g
2cm
5cm
24 hours
Sugar-water
2g
8g
2cm
4cm
36 hours
Regular water
2g
10g
2cm
6cm
36 hours
Sugar water
2g
10g
2cm
6cm
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Trial #1-3 Results Explanation
The results shown in the three trials show the length(cm) and the mass(g) of the gummy
bears in both sugar-water and regular water solutions after 12 hours, 24 hours and 36 hours.
Based on the data table and the bar graphs, the gummy bears in the regular water solution grew
more than the gummy bears in the sugar-water solution both by length and mass. The gummy
bears in the regular water solution grew more than the gummy bears in the sugar-water solution
due to the sugar concentration in the sugar-water solution. The gummy bears have sugar inside
while the regular water solution does not which causes more water to transport into the gummy
bear through the semipermeable membrane which in this case is the gelatin included in the
gummy bears. This causes the gummy bears in the regular water solution to expand in large
amounts. Since the sugar-water solution already consists sugar, the gummy bears in the sugarwater solution don’t expand as much as the gummy bears in the regular water solution because
less water needs to be transported into the gummy bear in the sugar-water solution in order to
create a balance of sugar outside and inside the gummy bear. This causes the gummy bears in the
sugar-water solution to expand less compared to the gummy bears in the regular water solution.
The pictures shown above show that some of the gummy bears broke apart. This is due to the
number of hours the gummy bears stayed in the solutions. The more the gummy bears stayed in
the solutions the more they grew which caused the membrane(gelatin), which was holding the
gummy bears together, to become weaker and break apart. This resulted in the gummy bears
breaking into chunks and pieces.
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Conclusion
After conducting the experiment 3 times for 12 hours, 24 hours and 36 hours and
gathering data and recording the results, it is indicated that the hypothesis made before
conducting the experiment was correct. As predicted, when the gummy bears stayed in both the
regular water solution and the sugar-water solution for the same amount of time, the gummy
bears in the regular water solution expanded more than the gummy bears in the sugar-water
solution. The bar graphs, the data tables and the pictures in the “results” section show that, in
general, the regular water solution gummy bears grew more, in both length and mass, than the
sugar-water solution gummy bears. These results are displayed because of the difference in sugar
concentration in the solutions compared to the sugar concentration in the gummy bears.
According to research done before the experiment, the gummy bears in the regular water
solution expanded more than the gummy bears in the sugar-water solution because of osmosis.
During osmosis, water molecules move through the semipermeable membrane in order to create
a balance on both sides of the membrane. In this experiment, the water moves inside the gummy
bears to create a balance of sugar concentration both outside and inside the gummy bears. The
reason why the regular water solution gummy bears grew more than the gummy bears is the
sugar-water solution is that the regular water solution had less concentration of sugar in the
solution compared to the sugar-water solution. Since the regular water solution had a low
concentration of sugar, more water particles needed to move into the gummy bear through the
semipermeable membrane(gelatin) in order to create a balance which caused the gummy bears to
expand in larger amounts compared to the gummy bears in the sugar water solution.
This experiment proves that gummy bears expand more in regular water solutions than in
sugar-water solutions. It also shows how sugar water can affect osmosis which can lead to a
15
better understanding of osmosis and create a way to use sugar-water for process of osmosis to
create something helpful that can be used in the real-world.
Next Time
This experiment can be improved by repeating the experiment with more trials in order to
get better results that are more reliable. It would also be better if the concentration of sugar in the
sugar-water solution was increased because it would lead to results that are better and more
accurate. Another thing that can be added to the experiment is to conduct this experiment with a
wide range of sugar concentration levels. For example, testing the gummy bears growth in sugarwater solutions with 2g, 4g, 6g, 8g and 10g of sugar and comparing their growth to the growth of
the gummy bears in the regular water solutions. Furthermore, it would be better to conduct this
experiment using many different brands of gummy bears.
16
Bibliography
Brigham Young University. (2019). Osmosis. [Online]. Available:
https://content.byui.edu/file/a236934c-3c60-4fe9-90aad343b3e3a640/1/module5/readings/osmosis.html
Environmental Protection Agency. (2005). Water Health Series Filtration Facts. [Online].
Available: 2005_11_17_faq_fs_healthseries_filtration.pdf
New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services. (2009). Reverse Osmosis Treatment for
Drinking Water. [Online]. Available: dwgb-2-11.pdf
U.S Food and Drug Administration. Reverse Osmosis. [Online]. Available: ucm072913.htm
2.1 Desalination by reverse osmosis. [Online]. Available:ch20.htm
Khan Academy. Osmosis: what is osmosis?(video). [Online]. Available:
https://www.khanacademy.org/science/high-school-biology/hs-energy-and-transport/hs-osmosisand-tonicity/v/osmosis
K.C. Verma and A.S. Kushwaha. (2014, October). Demineralization of drinking water: Is it
prudent ?. [Online]. Available: PMC4223198