Laboratory Activity
Protein Denaturation
Name:_____________________________________________________ Score:__________
Course, Year & section :_____________________________________ Date :_________
I. Objectives:
II. Materials:
Fork bowl(to put the eggs on)
4 small containers(of the same sizes) 4 eggs
water(tap and boiled) rubbing alcohol
III. Procedure:
1. Pour 75 ml of rubbing alcohol into one of the containers, tap water into the other container and the boiled water
into the other .
2. Crack the egg into the bowl and separate the yolks from the egg white.
3. Put 1/4 of the egg white into each of the set up on your step number 1. the remaining egg white will be put on
the fourth container.
4. Observe the changes that occurred in terms of the egg white’s color and consistency in each of the set up. If
you try to stir the different treatments, rinse your fork between stirs.
5. Wait for 30 minutes.
6. Use the fork to inspect the state of the egg whites in each of the treatment and note how they may have changed
over time. Record your observations.
IV. Observations :
1. Describe the consistency and color of the egg white on each of the given set up.
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2. Why does denatured egg white turn from clear to white?
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3. If more than one treatment denatured egg whites, do you think the treatments denatured egg whites in the same way?
Explain.
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4. Think about the effects of the two different water treatments. Do you think the water itself was denaturing proteins? If
not, what was it? If so, what was having the larger effect between the water treatments?
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5. Why might a living organism want to keep their proteins from denaturing?
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V. Conclusions:
