Question

Ideas for physical science investigatory project? Something that could be useful to society and achievable by a high school student.

Answer 1

Project #1: Making Soap Out of Guava
Basic hygiene should be available to everyone, but what about people who live in areas without easy access to grocery stores or pharmacies? This is a great question that makes you think about scientific alternatives to store-bought soap.

Below is an example project that creates soap from guava leaf extract and sodium hydroxide, but there's no shortage of materials you can use to replace the guava, like coconut oil or a fat like lard, butter or even the grease from your kitchen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ta08axXeT-g

Project #2: Used Cooking Oil as a Substitute for Diesel
Although creating diesel fuel out of cooking oils that will run a BMW may sound like a reach, it still makes for a great project. And who knows, maybe in doing this you'll actually figure out what was missing from previous attempts. Being an instant billionaire doesn't sound too bad to me.

It’s easy to make a small batch of biodiesel that will work in any diesel engine, from a model airplane engine to the family car. You don’t need any special equipment — an old juice bottle will serve as the “reactor” vessel — and on such a small scale you can quickly refine your technique and perform further experiments. After a few liters’ worth of experience, you’ll know if you’ve been bitten by the biodiesel bug.

The principle behind biodieseling is to take vegetable oil (either new or used), and process it into a fuel that’s thin enough to spray from a regular diesel engine’s fuel-injection system. This is done chemically, by converting the oil into two types of compounds: biodiesel, which shares the original oil’s combustibility, and glycerin, which retains the oil’s thick, viscous properties. Drain away the glycerin, and you’re left with a fuel that you can pour into any diesel vehicle with no further modification.

Once you get to the far side of the learning curve, making biodiesel is very much like cooking. In fact, a commercial biodiesel production plant shares more in common with a large-scale bakery than a petroleum refinery. There’s organic chemistry involved in baking a cake, but most bakers wouldn’t consider themselves organic chemists.

Project #3:
Plastic bags are actually illegal in Santa Monica, CA (and soon to be Los Angeles) because of their threat to the environment due to insane resistance to biodegradation. I didn't think they were that bad, but one plastic bag can take up to 1,000 years to break down completely, and it can even ruin your car along the way. So, creating a better biodegradable plastic bag would be a huge achievement.

The only question is how one would go about doing so, and what materials could be used? That's the question you can answer for your project. This project used cassava starch as an effective component for a biodegradable plastic, but you could try using a few different starches and see what works best.

Project #4: Solar Water Purification
One of the biggest world problems is finding clean water. While we in the states can find purified or drinkable tap water almost anywhere, millions of people around the world don't have access to clean drinking water.

Watch the video below for more information and a complete walk through of the scientific process.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=vbZZR2D3bUQ

Project #5: Make Homemade Glue from Milk
With milk, white vinegar and baking soda, you can make your own glue right at home. Make it an investigatory project by changing up the recipe and testing which results in the strongest glue. You could also try varying the ingredients to make it dry faster, or work on different materials (wood vs. plastic vs. paper).

Answer 2

Is my answer satiable?

Answer 3

hey

Answer 4

@LichKing thanks!

Answer 5

*laugh*

Answer 6

You are welcome!