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Winogradsky Column Lab Report
2,322
Winogradsky Column
Lab Report
AmberRoseJanson
5/7/2018
This descriptive lab report was to understand the soil microorganisms that live in one of our local water source environments. By adding different ingredients to a column of lake mud and water retrieved from the natural source. Our hope was to see visible changes in the column due to succesful flourishing colonies and the possibilites of multicelled organisms as well.
Introduction
The most Important factors to this experiment were the setup and choice of materials used and the interactons of those additions. Different soil microbes recycle different materials. If setup correctly the closed column ecosystem is able to continue exchanging these materials
C
S
W
Additions Include
Newspaper
Paper Towel
Added
Carbon
Carbon
Raw egg yoke
Egg shell
Added
Sulfur
White Sugar
Added
Sugar
Lake Water
Lake Soil
1 Bowl
1 Cylinder
1 Cup scoop
1 Mixing stick
1/2 Page newspaper
1 Sheet paper towel
1 Egg
1 Egg yoke
3/4 Tablespoon sugar
1- 9 inch cylinder for column
1 Ruler
1 Sharpie
1 Glass short walled mixing bowl
Gloves (pair)
Lake Water
Lake Soil
Materials and methods
Procedure
5 cm of shredded newspaper and paper towels mixed with a small layer of mud
Added 1 layer of 1 inch of mud
Layer of mud mixed with 3/4 tablespoon sugar
Layer of egg white mixed with 1 layer of mud
1 egg yolk on top untouched
followed by a thin layer of mud with specks of yoke showing
Weekly
Photos
of
the
column
10
Results
Week 1
Feb. 21st 2018
Week 1
Side View
Top View
Week 2
Feb. 26th 2018
Week 2
Week 3
March 7th 2018
Week 3
Week 4
March 14th 2018
Week 4
Week 5
March 21st 2018
Week 5
Week 6
March 26th 2018
Week 6
Week 9
April 16th 2018
Week 9
Week 10
April 23rd 2018
Bacteria from Top layer
of column
Spiral Bacteria found in the soil portion of our column after 10 weeks
Bacteria Water portion
of column
Week 10
Bacteria from lake mud portion of column
Our Column after 10 weeks
Photo: Courtesy of BMC Microbiology 2002
Close up
Discussion
&
Conclusion
Discussion and
Concluson
TIMELINE
TIMELINE
#3
#1
Feb 21st 2018
March 21st 2018
April 16th 2018
#2
Comparisons
Comparison
April 16th 2018
Too many additives to the pond water and mud didn't leave a sufficient environment for a multitude of natural microorganisms to thrive.
This resulted in the column not showing much variation for the duration of the experiment. The most profound change was in the height of the water and the
addition of a dark purple sulfur eating bacteria near the top where much of the raw egg yolk was administered
Feb 21st 2018
Discussion
At the beginning of the lab our hope was to extract findings such as living organisms, snails, worms, colorful bacteria and archea through the additions of carbon, sulfur and sugar to the pond water and mud
Because we chose to add a multitude of additives and their placement in the column, we were only able to sucessfully grow mold, fungus and bacterium. Multicelled organisms were unable to proliferate
Discussion
Other fellow classmates columns did include some better findings of multicelled organisms. This in turn had us question our methodolgy during the setup of our column.
Without a proper understanding of the reactions of such additives to the natural inhabitants within the original column ingredients of mud and lake water we destroyed the possibilities of seeing the total ecosystem others were able to during this experiment
To truly see a full spectrum of microorganism this experiment would need to be completed again from the beginning and the integrity of the setup better controlled.
Conclusion
Conclusion of Lab Report
This lab experiment was very informative not only on the topic matter of chemical interactions and ecosystems but also on encouraging a careful examination of experiment setup
Although we didn't find any visible animal organisms in our column due to fungal overgrowth on the top portion of our experiment, we were able to see changes in that growth and diversity within it, over the 10 weeks of the Winogradsky column lab
Watching these changes allowed us to see that the fungi is very much alive. The leading finding in our column was a dark purple sulfur eating microrganism which can be expected due to the addition of sulfur from raw egg
The most impressive result was the the appearance of bacillus mycoides, a spiral shaped bacterium that was easily recognized under the microscope.
In conclusion, I feel that the addition of raw egg near the top of the column compromised the possibility of sucessfully seeing the closed ecosystems demonstration of microrganisms and animal organisms because the hydrogen sulfur is life threatening.To obtain better results a new column experiment would need to be conducted
References
Carmen Di Franco1, Elena Beccari*2, Tiziana Santini1, Giuseppe Pisaneschi2 and Giorgio Tecce1 13 November 2002 Colony shape as a genetic trait in the pattern-forming Bacillus
mycoidesBMC Microbiology
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2180/2/33
References
Science Buddies. (2013, September) Soil Science: Make a Winogradsky Column. Scientific American