Waste to wonders: utilizing banana peels for bioplastic production

By:SheenRyanBauran

Energy scarcity is one of our country's major issues

The crisis is a major concern for the world because it is a limited natural resource that is heavily used to power the industrial society

Wilsonia Bagallon a Grade 12 student at Sawata National High School, was inspired by the scenario of limited energy supply to conduct research titled "Electrolytic Power source from Cacao (Theobroma Cacao) seed mucilage, which could benefit cacao growers and others who are interested in using cacao mucilage as a source of electricity

"The purpose of this investigation is to establish the amount of cacao seed mucilage in cacao fruit that is wasted during cacao harvest and to determine if cacao seed mucilage could be utilized as a source of electricity," said Bagallon Bagallon hypothesized that when combined with water, the mucilage from cacao seeds could generate an acidic compound that could serve as a source of electricity The cacao seed mucilage was separated into four treatments and fermented for up to three days during the process

The findings indicated that Treatments 2 and 3 had the greatest pH values, followed by Treatments 0 and 1 The pH level of Treatment 4 was the lowest According to the experiments findings, Treatments 2 and 3 have the same pH of 5, while Treatments 0 and 1 have the same pH of 4

The pH value is a gauge for a substances acidity or alkalinity From 1 to 14, with 7 serving as the neutral it is numbered Acidity is indicated by values under 7 and basicity by values beyond 7 Due to their pH levels being under 7, the commercial electrolyte solution and cacao solution obtained from the study are both acids

''I have different measurements in each sample in order to determine among samples that generate voltage In the voltage obtained from the cacao samples, it showed that a considerable amount of electrical voltage was generated from each cacao solution," said Bagallon

According to the experiment, Treatment 1 (30mL cacao mucilage+5 mL water) generated the most voltage followed by Treatment 2 (30mL cacao mucilage + 10 mL water) Treatment 3 (30mL cacao mucilage + 15 mL water) and Treatment 4 (30 mL commercial electrolyte solution) The lowest voltage yield was obtained with Treatment 0 (pure cacao mucilage)

The mucilage from cocoa fruit was identified as a potential source of electricity using an analysis of variance No significant difference between Treatments 3 and 4 was found by post hoc analysis According to this, the cacao electrolyte was equivalent to and may even serve as a replacement for the commercial electrolyte

"That was overwhelming after I completed the experimentation, because the solutions collected from the study were all acids, and they generated elec -tricity " said Bagallon Bagallon added that based on the research substances that give ions when dissolved in water are called electrolytes Because they all produce ions when dissolved in water they can be classified as acids bases and salts

These solutions generated electricity due to the mobility of the positive and negative ions, known as cations and anions In light of the trials mentionned, Bagallon concluded that unused cacao mucilage could serve as a source of electricity

How Solar Disinfection becomes a means to purify water resource

One of the most vital elements on earth is H2O For survival, all types of plants and animals need it There would not be life on Earth if there werent any water

The cleanliness of aqua that people drink and utilize cleanliness of aqua that people drink and utilize for various reasons is crucial For this basis pure germ- and chemicalfree water is essential Disinfecton of drinking water is one of several treatments that can enhance pubic health That is why students from Sawata Natonal High School investigated the feasibiity and usablity of soar water disinfecton as water supplies are under growing pressure due to popuation expanson, waste, and abuse Lency Jirah Comdoy and Krista Joy Galo purify water for drinking and domestic use through solar energy This method of treatment has become more prevalent because it typcaly uses low-tech methods to harness the heat and energy from the sun to make water cleaner and healther for human use as well as consumption

In the process of eliminating detrimenta chemicals, biological toxcants suspended partcles and gasses from tainted water, we have come up to eradicating pathogens through soar disinfection as study shows that the process involves contaminated water being filled in transparent glass bottles which are then exposed to the sun for approximately 6 hours Indcating that t can disinfect water by using two components of sunlght The first is germicidal UV-A radation The rays kill the microorganisms that cause diarrhea making the water safe to drink The second component is infrared radiaton which boosts the water temperature and s known as pasteurization when the water temperature s elevated to 70°C-75°C," Comidoy expaned

That impies that except for not vaporizng the water at boilng temperatures solar dstillation systems are comparable to traditiona water distilation systems Utlizng sun radiaton solar water disinfecton systems treat mcroboogically tainted owturbidity water to make it safe for consumption Fluds may be purified using an array of methodoogies one of which is by exposure to sunlight It is touted as being free, affordable and advantageous

Plastic is a dynamic material since it has a broad spectrum of uses A large portion of plastic production is used to make disposable items with long-lasting qualities that will be discarded indicating that it is neither sustainable nor biodegradable Production contains key harmful chemicals that have the capacity to adversely affect the environment through air, water, and land contamination - a threat to all living things

The uprising of environmental problems correlated to plastics prompted the cause of Lency Jirah G Comidoy a former student of Sawata National High School to conduct a research entitled "The Properties of Banana (Musa Sapientum) Based Bioplastic as Affected by the Different Levels of Plasticizer which aimed to produce bioplastic out of banana peels that are plable degradation tractable and highlightng the capacity to exceed commercial plastics in terms of tensile elongation at break and durabilty "The purpose of the study s to produce bioplastic the material out of fruit waste particularly banana peels that are rich in starch and cellulose synthesized with varied levels of glycerin To determine enhancements in terms of the plastic's Tensile Strength and Elongation Capacity in comparison to petroleum-based plastics " said Comidoy Comidoy hypothesized that the high amount of glycerin generated with starch and cellulose from banana peels may be used to create a bioplastic material given the bananas high starch and cellulose content During the process four treatments and one commercial plastic sample were used in the study with each treatment contains the same amount of neutral components but varying amounts of plasticizer to test the hypothesis "I made varied measurements per treatment to determine which synthesizing is the least and most sgnificant Wherein Treatment 0 had 100g banana peel + 500 mL gelatin, Treatment 1 with 100g banana peel + 500 mL gelatin + 10 mL glycerin, garnering the general P-value of 0 0637 The results from measurng the bioplastics tensie elongation at break showed that the bioplastcs capacity among treatments equalzes the commercal plastics indicating that there was no signifcant difference in terms of the bioplastic's elongation capacity compared to the petroleum-based plastic accordng to the analysis of varance " said Comidoy In terms of tensile strength measured by the load capacity in grams Treatment 0 carried the mean of 286 67g Treatment 1 carried 600g Treatment 2 carried 1033g Treatment 3 carred 1400g and the Commercal plastc carried the mean of only 360g garnering the general P-value of 0 001

"Measuring the bioplastic's tensile strength in terms of load capacity in grams revealed that there was a significant difference in terms of load capacity among treatments with Treatment 3 having the strongest tensile strength, followed by Treatments 2 1 and 0 and the commercial plastic sample having the lowest plastic strength This means that synthesizing properties of banana peels with a high amount of plasticizer will produce stronger bioplastics in comparison to the commercial one," said Comidoy In her research, Comidoy established that banana-based bioplastic outperformed commercial plastic in terms of tensile strength while being similar in terms of tensile elongation capacity implyng that banana-based bioplastic was comparable and could potentially be used in substitution of commercial plastics

Because of the content phase separation that occurs between starch and plasticizer the high amount of glycerin synthesized with starch and cellulose from banana peels wil optimize the scale of plasticizaton benefitng the product in terms of tensile strength and elongation capacity As a result of the aforementioned experiment Comidoy discovered that bioplastic made from banana peels is possible to be produced and enhanced

Environmentally

Conscious

Banana peels are converted into sustainable bioplastic utilizing a methodology that is ecologically sound

How can Wi-Fi radiation affect the root length of Mongo sprouts

By:JunalisaEna Pabils

risks concerns in line with that fuel need is soar water purifications main thing Due to the lack of fuel soar appications are significantly better than conventonal sources of energy since they do not produce pollution or health risks concerns in line with that In this nvestigation we employed a Completely Randomzed Design (CRD) and Anaysis of Variance (ANOVA) to examne the differences between treatments in terms of pH and hardness test resuts The colform test was assessed by the number of bacterial colonies produced The results of the hardness test revealed that Treatment 0 (SDW) and Treatment 3 (Water Exposed to Sunshne) had the maxmum hardness followed by Treatment 1 (Tap Water) and Treatment 2 (Chlornated Water) There was no significant change in hardness between treatments in the anaysis of varance

Ths means that treatments 0 and 3 have the same hardness as treatments 1 and 2, said the researchers

A water sampes capacity to consume soap or the dstnctve attribute of water that inhibits soap from latherng up can both be used to determine hardness Each water sampe wll have five drops of liquid soap added before being shaken five tmes And this wil determine how hard or soft the treatment is as the height of the bubbles and the water were measured The pH test results revealed that Treatment 1 (Tap Water) had the highest pH Treatment 0 (SDW) was followed by Treatment 3 (Water Exposed to Sunight) Whle Treatment 2 (Chlornated Water) had the owest pH Analysis of variance showed no statisticaly sgnificant varations across treatments This means that treatments O and 3 are equvaent as are treatments 1 and 2 Ths implies that al of the treatments are equivalent in terms of pH and that the total coliform test ndicated that Treatment 2 (Chorinated Water) and Treatment 3 (Water exposed to sunight) had the lowest colform count, followed by Treatment 0 (SDW) The greatest coiform count was found in Treatment 1 (Tap Water) This meant that the tap water was contaminated sad the researchers The waters pH level was measured to determine how basc or acidic it is at that particular instant Researchers findings indicate that harmfu germs in drnking water may be effectively eliminated by solar disnfection As water is exposed to soar radiation root standard seven days further that the mongo sprouts in the control group were in good heath our study, it was statisticaly proven that the electromagnetic radiation affects the health of mongo sprout (Vigna Radata) and owers ts capacity to germinate because the mean root length of the experimenta group obtained beow normal The experimenta group represents the mongo beans that are exposed to W-Fi radiation whle the control group represents the mongo beans that are free from W-Fi radiaton

To sum up the mongo sprout exposed to electromagnetic fields has sgnifcantly decreased ablity to be heathy while the control group attained the standard root length that constitutes a healthy one asserted Morales Wreess routers and humans have something in common but the dfference is that people transmit causes and receive effects to convey the outcome, unlike electromagnetic waves

Humans cannot prohbit themselves from using Wi-F routers, which implies electromagnetic radiation wil continue to be released Individuals are exposed to their own wireless network as well as wireless routers from neighbors and other sources as many were bored at work because of tasks, proects and the inabiity to contact wth their frends and relatves

"Maybe our study is akin to human beings who spend a ot of time using Wi-F routers to link the entire world The EMFs may flow through the walls and there is no way to hide But, the impacts of it can be mitigated by their own behaviors Do not expose too many live beings to this type of radiation When WiFi is not n use switch it off and the discharge of electromagnetic radiation into space wll cease," said Morales Humans ntelectual ablity generated many fictional objects resulting in their gradua existence Wi-Fi is a menta vision product that is regarded as mankind's best creation It is wreless but it has an nvisible chain to reach the realm where a cear mpression of the truth s supplied, questions are answered doubts are verified and mental ambiguity is eliminated Yet everything should be done in moderation because too much is harmful Knowledge must be lnked to acton and action must be linked to knowledge and they must be connected!