Answer 1:
What a timely and interesting project!
Bisphenol A is an aromatic molecule (it has
ring-shaped structures of carbon atoms), which
means it will absorb light. In theory, Bisphenol
A (BPA) concentration can easily be measured used
a spectrophotometer (an instrument that shines
light on a sample and measures how much is
blocked/absorbed by the sample). Many high school
classrooms have access to one or several-- maybe
even a middle school. Otherwise, they are mostly
found in labs on the university campus. BPA
absorbs light maximally at 211 nm and 276 nm (the
near ultraviolet). This can be converted to
concentration either by making a standard curve
(use a known amount of BPA in several clean
samples, then use those values to make a line of
best fit to match your unknown samples against),
or by using the extinction coefficient of BPA, a
known value. Unfortunately, many other
substances (such as amino acids and full proteins,
for instance) also absorb in this range. When
scientists measure BPA, they typically use complex
techniques such as high performance liquid
chromatography (HPLC) to separate BPA from other
substances before measurement. An HPLC is
probably not available for a middle school
project. Confounding this, the amount of
BPA that leeches out of plastic is very small--
in the parts per billion (the equivalent of
finding a pinch of salt in an olymptic swimming
pool), so extremely sensitive equipment is
necessary. Good luck! |
Answer 2:
I did a quick search to see what had been used,
but there's a caution to that since most articles
were about more complex samples (blood plasma,
urine) than just water. In any event, it seems
that at the least one would need (also due to the
small amounts to be detected) to use a GC/MS
machine.. In addition, there may be some
pretreatment of the samples required (may not be
absolutely required for just measuring BPA in
water). Some articles for future
reference: article-1
article-2
article-3
article-4 Click Here to return to the search form.
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