A “Supplement” for the Routine Laboratory Experience: Take Two or Three Capsules and go into the Lab

TCE

The Chemical Educator

ISSN: 1430-4171 (electronic version)

Table of Contents

Abstract Volume 16 (2011) pp 158-159

A “Supplement” for the Routine Laboratory Experience: Take Two or Three Capsules and go into the Lab

Kathy Reese, Alyx Frantzen, and Michele Harris*

Department of Chemistry, Stephen F. Austin State University, Nacogdoches, TX 75962, write2drh@yahoo.com
Received July 1, 2010. Accepted February 27, 2011.

Published: 18 June 2011

Abstract. According to an MSNBC report, 15 billion dollars were spent on nutritional supplements in 2008. [1] One type of nutritional supplement available is enzyme supplements. The manufacturers claim thatenzyme supplements aid in digestion by assisting existing systems in breaking down large biopolymers into their monomeric units. In an effort to bring a “real world” example into the undergraduate physical chemistry laboratory, we required our students to do a short-term research project related to a traditional experiment done in the laboratory. An enzyme assay and kinetic study were performed using two commercially available supplements which contained several enzymes including invertase. The results from the commercial supplements were compared to the kinetics of pure invertase purchased from Sigma Chemical Company.

Key Words: Laboratories and Demonstrations; general chemistry

(*) Corresponding author. (E-mail: write2drh@yahoo.com)

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