Form 5 Investigative Project 2019

Plan and Design

Analysis and Interpretation
Title: Vitamin C Content in Vitamin C Tablets and cantaloupe/ cantaloupe Juices
Problem Statement: Brendon and Alex are debating the vitamin C content of tablets versus
cantaloupe or cantaloupe juices. Alex believes that one would obtain more vitamin C from a
tablet taken at the prescribed dosage while Brendon believes that one will receive more Vitamin
C from eating one cantaloupe or drinking the outlined dose of cantaloupe juice.
Hypothesis: Cantaloupe and its juices would have a higher content of ascorbic acid because the
cantaloupe is the fruit with the highest ascorbic acid content.
Aim: To determine if more vitamin C is obtained from a tablet or the Cantaloupe itself.

Apparatus/ Material: potassium iodide, beaker, distilled water, volumetric flask, soluble starch, 2
conical flasks, pipette, pipette filler, burette, wash bottle retort stand, methyl orange

Method:
STARCH INDICATOR SOLUTION:
1. Weigh 0.25 g of soluble starch and add it to 50 mL of almost boiling water .
2. In a 100 mL conical flask, stir to dissolve the starch and cool before using. 

TITRATION:
1. Dissolve a single Vitamin C tablet in 200 ml of water in a volumetric flask.
2. Extract cantaloupe juice from the fruit and strain with cheesecloth to remove seeds and pulp.
3. Pipette 20 ml of the cantaloupe juice into a conical flask.
4. Add 150 ml of distilled water and 1ml of starch indicator solution into the conical flask.
5. Titrate the fruit juice with 0.005 mol iodine solution and observe the results.
6. Repeat the experiment until concordant results are obtained
Variables:
Manipulated:
Controlled:
Responding:

Results:
TABLE SHOWING RESULTS OF THE EXPERIMENT
Burette Rough 1 2 3
Reading/cm2

Final
Volume/cm2
Initial
Volume/cm3
Volume of
Iodine Solution
used/cm3

Observations:

Expected Results:
The Cantaloupe/Cantaloupe juice would have a higher concentration of ascorbic acid than the
Vitamin C tablet. The iodine will be immediately reduced to iodide because of the presence of
the ascorbic acid, which will cause the solution to turn a pale blue colour. Then, the ascorbic acid
will be oxidized and the excess iodine reacts with the starch indicator, which will form a blue –
black precipitate.
Limitations:
The measurements of the iodine solution and or the cantaloupe and starch indicator solution
could be incorrect, causing the calculations to be incorrect.

Precautions:
Assumptions: