CHEMISTRY

INVESTIGATORY
PROJECT
To study and calculate the content of
ascorbic acid in different citrus
fruits
(2021-22)

Done By :- R.Manit

Class :- XII-A
 Sainkpuri Secunderabad-500094

This is to certify that R.Manit

Of class XII A of Bhavans Sri Ramakrishna

Vidyalaya has successfully completed the
chemistry investigatory project.

Hall ticket number: 20619137

(Internal examiner) (external examiner)

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
 I take this oppurtunity to express my
profound gratitude and deep regards to my
Chemistry teacher – Mrs.Pushpa Ganesh Mam,
for the exemplary guidance, monitoring and
constant encouragement throughout the
course of this project. The blessing, help and
guidance given by her shall carry us a long way
in the journey of life on which I am about to
embark.
I also take this oppurtunity to express a deep
sense of gratitude to, Mrs.Jyoti Aparna Mam,
Principle, B.S.R.K.V for her cordinal support,
information and guidance, which helped me in
completing this task through various stages.
Remarkably, I would also like to express my
hearty gratitude to the lab assistants for
their support during the making of this
project accomplish successfully.
CONTENTS:-

 Aim

 Introduction

 Experiment

 Observations

 Conclusion

 Bibliography
 INTRODUCTION
Vitamin C or ascorbic acid in citrus fruits is a water soluble
carbohydrate like substance involved in certain metabolic processes of
animals. Although most of the animals can synthesise vitamin C, it is
necessary in the diet of some including men and other primates. In
order to prevent scurvy, disease characterized by Haemorrhage
especially in skin and mucous membranes Vitamin C was identified as a
curative agent for survey in 1928. The name ascorbic acid is derived
from the expression Anaisearbatic vitamin, referring to vitamin’s
ability to prevent and to curve scurvy. First isolated in 1928 by
Hungarian biochemist and Nobel Prize winner Albert Seent Ceyorghi .
Vitamin C has been the object of continued active laboratory research
to determine the specific mechanism of action of cells.

STRUCTURE:-
Ascorbic acid (AA) is a simple sugar. It is the most active reducing
agent known to occur naturally in living tissues, and is easily reversibly
oxidized to Dehydroascorbic acid
(DHA). Ascorbic acid is a white
crystalline stable substance, when in
dry light and air. It is easily soluble in
water and easily oxidized especially in
alkaline medium and exposure to
heat and light, it reacts with metals,
particularly copper. It is fairly
soluble in cold acid solution. Though
the first stage in its oxidation to DHA is reversible, oxidation to
diketo-gulnic acid cannot be reversed.
PROPERTIES:-
1. ACIDITY
Ascorbic acid, the formula of which C6H8O6 , behaves as a vinylogous
carboxylic acid, wherein double bond (“vinyl”) transmits electron pairs
between the hydroxyl and carbonyl. There are two resonance
structures for the deprotonate form, differing in the position of
double bond.
Another way to look at ascorbic acid is to consider it an enol. The deprotonate
form is an enolate, which is usually strong basic. However, adjacent double bond
stabilized the deprotonated form.

2. TAUTOMERISM
Ascorbic acid is rapidly in converts into two unstable diketone
tautomers by proton transfer, although it is the most stable in the enol
form. The proton of the enol is lost, reacquired by electrons in the
form of double bond, to produce a diketone. It is an enol reaction there
are two possible forms: 1,2-diketone and 1,3-diketone.

3. DETERMINATION
The concentration of the solution of ascorbic acid can be determined in
many ways; the most common way involves titration with an oxidizing
agent.
 DCPIP-
A commonly- used oxidizing agent is the dye 2,6-dichlorophenol –
indophenols, or DCPIP for short. The blue dye is run into the ascorbic
acid solution until a faint pink colour persists for 15 seconds.
  IODINE-
Another method involving using iodine and a starch indicator, wherein
iodine reacts with ascorbic acid, and when all the ascorbic acid had
reacted, the iodine is excess, then forming a blue – black complex with
starch indicator. This indicates the end point of the titration. As an
alternative, ascorbic acid can be reacted with iodine in excess,
followed by back titration with sodium thiosulfate while using starch as
indicator
 IODATE AND IODINE-
The above method involving iodine requires making up and standardizing
the iodine solution. One way around this is to generate the iodine in
presence of ascorbic acid by the reaction of iodate and iodide ion in
acid solution.

 N – BROMOSUCCINIMIDE-

A much-less-common oxidizing agent is N bromosuccinimide,

(NBS). In titration the NBS oxidizes the ascorbic acid 9 in
presence of potassium iodide and starch). When the NBS in
excess (i.e., the reaction is complete). The NBS liberates
iodine from the potassium iodide, which then forms the
blue/black complex with starch, indicating the end–point of
the titration.
 EXPERIMENT
AIM:-
To study and calculate the content of ascorbic
acid in different citrus fruits.

REQUIREMENTS:-

 Water
 Spirit
 Starch
 Iodine (solid)
 Lemon Juice
 Orange Juice
 Citrus Maxima Juice
 Burette
 Pipette
 Conical flask
 Standard flask
 Bunsen’s burner
 Muslin cloth
PROCEDURE :-

 Weight 0.254g of solid iodine and pour in a dry beaker.

Add 4g of solid potassium iodide.
 Then add distilled water then dissolve iodine and
potassium in it.
 Transfer this solution to a clean 100ml volumetric flask
and prepare required quantity of distilled water that was
added to make 100ml of iodine solution.
 In this way another 100ml of iodine solution is prepared.
This solution has a molarity of 0.01M.
 Now a starch solution is prepared by adding a spatula of
starch to 100ml of water and subsequently boiling it.
 The fruit juices are extracted and filtered using muslin
cloth.
 The iodine solution of 0.01M is taken in a burette and 5ml
of filtered juice is pippeted out in a conical flask.
 To the juice 1ml of starch solution is added.
 The solution of juice is titrated against iodine solution.
 The process is stopped at the point the colour of solution
in conical flask changes from fruit juice to violet colour.
 Three concordant readings are taken.
OBSERVATIONS:-

 The end point is reached when a little drop of DCPIP

solution is needed to turn citrus fruit juices into a
dark blue color solution which is same color as DCPIP
solution.

 When DCPIP solution is added into sample citrus

fruit juices (orange, lemon and lime juices), the
sample juices need more drops of DCPIP solution
than ascorbic acid standard solution to reach the
end point.
Result:-
The following are the percentage of ascorbic acid to
various citrus fruits.
 Lemon juice = 31.68%
 Orange juice = 49.28%
 Citrus Maxima = 70.4%
CONCLUSIONS:-
 The percentage of ascorbic acid was found to be
less in lemon juice and more in Citrus Maxima juice.

 Here starch solution was added to the fruit juices,

before doing titration due to which some of the
fruit content reacted starch and a permanent
complex was formed which could not be oxidized.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:-

 Sarawathi lab manual chemistry– XII

 Comprehensive lab manual chemistry
 www.britanica.com
 www.wolframalpha.com
 www.google.com