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TITLE:

AIM: To determine which citrus fruit has the highest acidity

PROBLEM STATEMENT

HYPOTHESIS: When the pH levels in the citrus fruits are tested, the lime will have the highest
acidity.

EQUIPMENT:

 Plastic pipette  Knife

 Test tubes
MATERIALS:

 Orange
 Lime
 Grape fruit
 Lemon
 pH scale

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DIAGRAM:

PROCEDURE:

1. The lemon was cut with the knife and squeezed into a test tube .
2. Step 1 was repeated with orange ,lime and grapefruit .
3. A pipette was used to transfer a small amount of lemon juice to a pH strip.
4. The procedure was repeated twice to obtain a accurate result .
5. Steps 3 and 4 were repeated for orange ,lime and grapefruit .

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CONTROLLED VARIABLE:

 pH strips used
 The juice from each citrus fruit used

MANIPULATED VARIABLES:

 The different type of citrus fruit used

DEPENDENT VARIABLE:

 The pH level of the different fruits

EXPECTED RESULTS:

Type of citrus fruit pH

Trial 1 Trial 2 Trial 3
Lime 2 2 2
Lemon 3 3 3
Orange 5 5 5
Grapefruit 5 5 5

TABLE SHOWING THE TYPE OF FRUIT AND THEIR CORRESPONDING PH

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TREATMENT OF RESULTS:

The pH is an indication for the acidity of a substance. It is determined by the number of free
hydrogen ions (H+) in a substance.

A higher level of acidity means a higher concentration of hydrogen ions present in the aqueous
solution .

pH is related to hydrogen ion concentration via the formula pH =-log[H+].

This means that the higher the hydrogen ion concentration , the lower the pH value .

CHEMICAL PRINCIPLES:

Citric acid is an acid that gives lemons, oranges and other citrus fruits their sour taste. Lemon
juice has 6-7% of the acid.

pH is a number used to indicate the concentration of hydrogen ions in a solution. The number
generally ranges from 0 to 14. A pH below 7 indicates that a solution is acidic, and a pH above 7
indicates that a solution is basic (alkaline), A neutral solution, such as pure water, is neither
acidic nor basic and has a pH of 7 at 25° C. pH stands for potential of hydrogen. pH is measured
using an electronic pH meter or with acid-base indicators. The colour of an indicator depends on
the concentration of hydrogen ions. pH paper contains several indicators that change colour at
different pH’s. When dipped into a solution, the paper’s colour indicates the approximate pH of
the solution.

LIMITATIONS:

❋ Sources of error

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 The concentrated HCl might not have been diluted properly.

 The inner membrane of the egg might not have been removed properly.

❋Precaution

 It was ensured that the all the eggshells were placed into the beaker.
 It was ensured that none of the eggshell went through the filter paper.

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