The Chemistry Department at Missouri Western State University collaborated with a local vineyard and designed a new laboratory experiment for the second semester general chemistry curriculum. The purposes of the new experiment are to strengthen fundamental laboratory skills, and emphasize a real-world application of chemical principles and techniques. In this experiment, students traveled to the vineyard to collect soil, leaf, and grape samples. In the field, students tested the grapes for sugar content using a portable refractometer. The soil and leaf samples were categorized by the variety of grape plant and the depth of the soil. Back at the laboratory, the soil samples were tested for common nutrients with a Rapitest kit. The elemental composition of the leaf and soil samples were measured with an X-ray fluorescence spectrometer. This measurement revealed that grape leaves have a high concentration of calcium, therefore a quantification of calcium in grape leaves was attempted. Two methods, atomic absorption (AA) and titration by EDTA, were used to determine the amount of calcium in grape leaves. Both involved dry ashing the grape leaves in an adaptation from another experiment. The results from both methods will be presented.

Grape leaves of wrath: measurement of nutrients in soil, sugar in grapes, and calcium in leaves

Macromolecular Chemistry: The Second Century

[Author Benefits](https://scimeetings.acs.org/?utm_source=pubs_content_marketing&utm_medium=website&utm_campaign=0320_MCF_NPI_Launch_Spring_Homepage&ref=pubs_content_marketing)

[How to use SciMeetings](https://storage.googleapis.com/dl.morressier.com/acs/SciMeetings-ACSSpring2020-HowToGuide_M3020-Final.pdf)

[Frequently Asked Questions](https://storage.googleapis.com/dl.morressier.com/acs/SciMtng_ACSNMSp2020_FAQ_M3120_Final.pdf)

ACS Spring 2020 National Meeting & Expo

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.