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Enzyme Catalase Reaction Lab

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Organisms use enzymes in order to break down potentially harmful materials in the body and to carry out chemical reactions. One such process that involves substances and enzymes in the body is processing H2O2 by the liver and other body systems into water and oxygen. In an enzyme catalysis lab, the goal was to find out how, as time passes, how much H2O2 will be left over after reacting with the enzyme catalase. Samples from various times were used in order to stop the catalysis sulfuric acid (H2SO4) was used to denature the enzyme in each sample. Using times from 10 to 360 seconds in different increments to first catalyze, the samples were left over the weekend with a parafilm covering to be titrated the next day. The titrations revealed that as time progresses, the hydrogen peroxide will continue to break down until there would be nothing left if the reaction continued to happen. As the reaction takes …show more content…

This study attempts to find how H2O2, H2SO4¬, and KMnO¬¬4 react together to tell how catalase will catalyze H2O2 over time. The way that H2O2 breaks down is illustrated by 2 H2O2  2 H2O + O2 (Campbell, 2008). In the absence of catalase, this happens extremely slowly. In the presence of catalase, the reaction speeds up and can be stopped by using H2SO4¬ to measure the amount of hydrogen peroxide used over time. To measure the quantity used up over a specific time interval, potassium permanganate (KMnO¬¬4) is added to the solution to essentially “eat up” the leftover hydrogen peroxide from the reactions with the

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