Toilet or Ice Water: Which Contains More Bacteria?

Overview

Objectives/Goals The purpose of this experiment is to compare the amount of bacteria in the ice machines and the toilet water in hotels. Do we know if the ice served from the ice machines are safe to drink and free from bacteria? The hypothesis of this project was the hotels toilet water will contain more bacteria then the water from the hotels ice machine. Methods/Materials The procedures done for this experiment was to first meet with the San Diego City Water Laboratory, to find out how they test for safe drinking water. Then you collect eighteen ice samples and toilet samples from 18 different hotels. After setting up the samples in the Petri dishes and pouring the agar in the dishes, the bacteria were allowed to grow. Results The results of the projects did not support the hypothesis. The results showed that the ice machine ice water contained more bacteria than the toilet water 72% of the samples. Conclusions/Discussion The conclusion was that the ice machine ice contains a significant amount of bacteria. In many of the samples the ice water was not safe to drink and the toilet water was less contaminated. The results show that the source ( ice machines) perception of clean water is different from reality.

Competition history

• CSEF 2008 Microbiology · Entry J1404

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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