Saccharides Essay

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Testing Saccharides Saccharides, which are also known as carbohydrates, are the most essential biomolecule for the human body. Carbohydrates are what run the body to function. Saccharides help your brain and nervous system to function properly. What we were testing in both experiments was to see if there was a presence of saccharides. More specifically in these experiments, we tested if there were reducing sugars with the Benedicts reagent in the first experiment and if there were starches present with Lugol’s solution in the second experiment. Hypothesis: The solutions with the highest amount of sugar will turn a red-orange when mixed and heated with the Benedict’s reagent. Null Hypothesis: The solutions with the highest amount of sugar will not turn a red-orange when mixed and heated with the Benedict’s reagent. In the first experiment to test if there were reducing agents, we used Benedict’s reagent. When using Benedict’s reagent, monosaccharides can be identified. Benedict’s reacts with double bonds connected to the oxygen atom in either the free ketone or aldehyde groups (which are the reducing sugars in saccharides) to reduce the copper sulfate in Benedict’s reagent (Harris-Haller 2014). When the substance is heated with Benedict’s reagent, an orange-red precipitate forms within the solution. There were 10 substances in all that we tested for. They were glucose, water, lemon juice, Coca Cola, egg batter, lemon-lime soda, diet lemon-lime soda, Kraft Italian dressing, skim milk and butter. The positive control was the glucose and the negative control was the water. Twenty drops of each sample of substance was added to the test tubes (in all there were 10 test tubes). After the solutions were added in their own test tube, 20 drops of Benedict’s reagent was added. Each individual test tube was placed in boiling water and removed after 5 minutes to test if

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