Bernard Stepteau
Biology Lab 101/Th 8:00am – 9:50am
2-26-2014
Dr Laynes
Hypothesis: As the temperature of the enzyme catalase rises the activity of the reaction will decrease.
Objectives: The objective is to compare catalase activity at different temperatures.
Introduction
Catalase speeds the breakdown of hydrogen peroxide. Catalase is present in every plant and animal organ. This is useful because hydrogen peroxide is harmful to cells. Temperature effects the enzyme effectiveness. Increase in temperature causes molecules to move faster. Too high of a temperature will cause an enzyme to denature. The enzyme loses its original shape and the active sight will no longer cause an reaction.
Materials wax pencil
3 clean test tubes catalase hydrogen peroxide ruler Procedure First we marked 3 test tubes with the wax pencil at 1cm and 5 cm levels and also numbered them 1,2 and 3. Second we filled each test tube with catalase to the 1 cm mark. Next test tube 1 was was placed in refrigerator, test tube 2 in the refrigerator incubator and test tube 3 in boiling water. We let them sit for 15 mins. After the 15 mins was up we removed each test tube one at a time and filled each one with hydrogen peroxide to the 5 cm mark. The tubes were swirled to mix them. We then waited 20 sec.
We measured the height of each bubble column in each test tube with a ruler.
Tube
Temperature
Bubble Column Height
1 Refrigerator
5
6cm
2 Incubator
34
5 cm
3 Boiling Water
80
0 cm
Results The data shows that as the temperatures rises there is less reaction from the enzyme. The tube from the refrigerator had the most activity while the one from the incubator was a close second and the test tube from the boiling water had no activity at all. The reason for this is that the catalase was denatured by the temperature of the boiling water.
Conclusion This proves the effects of temperature on enzymes