Are Herbal Remedies as Effective as Commonly Prescribed Antibiotics against Bacteria?

Overview

Objectives/Goals To determine if dandelion roots and/or peppermint leaves are as effective in fighting E.coli as erythromycin and penicillin. I believed that the man-made antibiotics would be more effective. Methods/Materials I put E. coli in ten Petri dishes(two for each independent variable)and incubated them for 48 hours to allow the bacteria to grow. I recorded my results and then added the antibiotics and herbs. The control was distilled water. All test samples were incubated for 48 hours. To get the final results bacterial colonies were counted, measured, averaged and recorded. Results The average size of a bacterial colony before inoculation for dandelion root was 23 mm, for peppermint 35 mm, for erythromycin 21 mm, for penicillin 16 mm and for distilled water 35 mm. After inoculation the average colony size for dandelion root was 5 mm, for peppermint 2 mm, for erythromycin 2 mm, for penicillin 5 mm, and for distilled water 4 mm. The greatest difference in size of bacterial colony before and after inoculation was with the peppermint test sample. Conclusions/Discussion I think my hypothesis was incorrect because peppermint is proven to help inner stomach and intestine problems. Therefore it would work better against E. coli. The man-made antibiotics are not necessarily proven to cure those specific problems. Peppermint worked the best.

Competition history

• CSEF 2008 Product Science (Biological) (Junior Division Only) · Entry J1805

Resources

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