So today I was back in 201P finishing up the remainder of last night's procedure. The first thing I did was turn on the Spectrophotometer (Spec 20) and let it warm up for 15 minutes. Then I retrieved my samples and pipetted the solutions - my Standard Blank (distilled water), Glucose Standard (water + the glucose that came in the kit), Reagent Blank (the blank from the Starch digestion - contains only the reagents), and the 3 cornstarch samples - into their respective cuvettes.
This step was all about timing. If we let the reaction for each sample go on for differing amounts of time, we aren't going to be evaluating them on the same standard. So upon adding the Glucose Assay Reagent to each sample, I had to incubate each tube for exactly 30 minutes in a 37˚C water bath; then, I had to stop each reaction by adding 2ml of the 12N Sulfuric Acid solution.
I figured the easiest, most efficient way I could do this was by adding the Glucose Assay Reagent to the first tube (standard blank) mix, and then put it in the incubator; wait 1 minute, before adding the reagent to each subsequent tube. Then, when time was up for the first tube, I would add the H2SO4, take that out, and then wait another minute; that's how I knew the 30 minutes was up for the second tube, and so on and so forth.
But I'm not going to lie - it was pretty nervewracking. I don't think my eyes ever left the screen of my i-phone timer.
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