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Draft Research Proposal

For my project I am going to do something with germs and hand sanitisers. My question will be something like **“Do antibacterial hand sanitisers prevent germs from growing?”** I am still unsure about the exact way that I will conduct this experiment but at this stage I think that I will soak something (eg. a bit of tissue or a cotton bud/swab) in the soap/sanitiser and then see if the germs grow by using an ultraviolet light. I will use a few different brands including antibacterial and non-antibacterial and see which one is the most successful. From here I can then research about what it is in the most successful one that actually prevented the germs from growing/ killed them. I have quite a few sources of information for this project. These include the internet (particularly a few good websites that I have found) and books. The variables of this project are things like the different brand hand wash that is used (controlled) and the amount of germs that grow (dependant variable). The things that I will need for this project are a range of different hand washes, cotton buds/tissue and an ultraviolet light which makes viewing the germs possible (I am able to use the one in the home economics room however I am also possibly able to go to the Adelaide University). There are two possible ways that I can perform my experiment and I am unsure yet about which way. These are to either do as I said above and soak something in the hand wash, leave it for a certain amount of time and then look at it to see the germ growth, or I look at a surface under an ultraviolet light to see the amount of germs on there and then apply the hand wash to the surface and see what happens. The first way is possibly the better as it will be quite hard to tell how many germs are killed in the second way. I am not sure about the safety concerns of this project although I will have to take this into consideration. I do not think that this project should take too long although I will have to make sure that the swabs (if I choose to do it this way) are left for the right amount of time, although I am unsure at this stage how long this should be. I think that I will only have to perform this experiment once.

Final Research Proposal For my major project I am testing a range of different hand washes and soaps (antibacterial and normal) and testing their effectiveness. My question is **“do antibacterial hand sanitizers actually kill germs?”** I am going to conduct this experiment by treating different Petri dishes with “dirty hands” and then wash them with a particular soap. I will then treat another petri dish with my clean hands. I will then continue to wash my hands with different brands/kinds of soaps and then treat petri dishes after each wash. The petri dishes will be clearly labeled and then placed in an incubator a constant temperature of 37 degrees. Once the experiment is finished I can clearly see which one grew the most and least. I can source information for my experiment from books and the internet. The website that I got the experiment from is very useful as are a number of other websites that I have found. The variables in my project are the temperature of the incubator (constant), the amount of germs that grow (dependant) and the different brand/type of hand wash that is used (another controlled variable). For this experiment I will need some prepared petri dishes that contain agar medium and nutrients (hopefully I can source these from school or I could purchase them), an incubator (again which I can hopefully source from the school), a range of different hand washes and antibacterial soaps and possibly an ultraviolet light so I can look at the germs in a different way (I am able to use the one in the home economics room). There are not many safety factors that I will have to consider during this experiment however the few that I do are important. This is that once the germs have been left to grow they should not be touched nor should the vapors be breathed in. Once the experiment is completed they need to be properly killed using bleach. I will have to be cautious that the bleach doesn’t touch my (or anyone else’s) skin, eyes or clothes as it will burn. These are the two biggest safety factors with doing my experiment. This experiment should not take more than a few days to one week to complete. Once the petri dishes have been treated and placed in the incubator growth should begin within a few days. I can monitor this and record what I see to determine which one grew the most and least.