Plants sweat like us too!

EQUIPMENTS:

1. Two empty soda bottles or water bottles (Must be transparent)

2. Some fresh or pure water

3. Modeling clay

4. Red food coloring (Can be obtained from a grocery store or a mega shop)

5. A healthy leaf along with a long stem

6. Making tape

7. A magnifying glass or a convex lance (Can be obtained from any science supply store)

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. At first fill one soda or water bottle with fresh or pure water and add ten drops of red food coloring in it.

2. Now model the modeling clay around the stem of the leaf you have collected so that the stem can extend into the water while the modeling clay seals the bottle.

3. Now push the clay plug which you have modeled into the mouth of the bottle which is filled with water.

4. Now turn the empty bottle upside down and position its mouth over the leaf.

5. Place the complete setup in direct sunlight.

6. Use masking tape to hold the two in their places.

7. Leave the setup under sunlight for 1 hour.

8. After 1 hour use the magnifying glass or the convex lance to examine the upper bottle.

RESULT:

You’ll see tiny drops of red water inside the upper bottle.

EXPLANATION:

Plants lose water by releasing vapor through their leaves all the time. Leaves have special holes named stomata. These holes are distributed through the leaves. They are used by the plants to get rid of extra water it may have taken via its roots. The process of losing water through the stomata is called transpiration. Usually we don’t see transpiration because plants lose water vapor very little at a time. But in our experiment we were able to trap the released water vapor in the empty bottle which we placed upon the leaf. The red food color helped us indicate the trapped vapor which was turned into red drops of water. It also helped us prove that the leaf was using the water it took up through its stem for its cellular process including transpiration.

MORE EXPERIMENTS FOR YOU:

1. Try using a bigger leaf to see if there is more water in the empty bottle placed on the leaf.

2. Try using a smaller leaf to see if there is less water in the empty bottle placed on the leaf.