HL Chemistry IA Advice

[wilsonisdead]

Hi y'all, first post so I'm kinda nervous

 

So I have been asked to think on my Chem IA, and I've been thinking about this:

 

Testing and comparing the calcium content of various nutrition supplements (pills, tablets etc) and if I want/need to, put those figures in scale to daily recommended intake of calcium and therefore determine the 'most suitable' product.

 

I'd like to hear what y'all have to say on this topic, and also tips for how to test for calcium quantifiably~

[Siddhakshi]

I think you need to have a really well-equipped laboratory to be able to determine Ca content, especially if you're looking at a tablet which contains other substances and not just calcium. If I'm not mistaken, you need an atomic absorption spectrophotometer which you're probably not going to find in an average school lab. And it's next to impossible to obtain permission to use one from a University lab (trust me, I've tried). You have loads of time, think of a topic which is viable in your lab. Ask your teacher what apparatus and materials your school can offer you before going any further with research, otherwise it's really going to be disappointing if you get a wonderful topic you can't go further with. Best of luck!

[Tom Hiddleston]

Agree with what Siddhakshi said, impurities (things that aren't Ca) are going to make extraction quite difficult if you don't have the right solvents to precipitate out substances. Also another roadblock to this lab passing the threshold between a 6 or 7 would be that a lot of the substances would already have the calcium percentage for daily recommended dosage on there, thereby detracting from your question and what you hope to test.

 

Maybe try something like whether or not the label and what you did for extraction match up, if you really wanted to work with calcium.

 

Cheers X