Biochemistry-+McMush+Lab

Just what’s in a fast food meal? We hear all the time that fast food meals are “really bad for us,” but do they have anything good in them? Can they provide any nutrition whatsoever? Are they really high in fat? Well, let’s find out!

Carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, and nucleic acids are organic molecules found in every living organism. This means that they are present in the plants and animals that you use every day as food.

Carbohydrates are sugars. Carbohydrates are used by living organisms as an important energy source. Examples of carbohydrates include glucose, sucrose, lactose, ribose, deoxyribose, cellulose, chitin, and starch.

Lipids found in animals are called fats and are solids at room temperature. Oils are lipids found in plants and are liquids at room temperature. One gram of lipids stores twice as much energy as one gram of carbohydrates. An important group of lipids is the phospholipids, which makes up cell membranes. Steroids are also lipids. Examples of steroids include cholesterol, estrogen, testosterone, and morphine.

Made up of amino acids, proteins serve as the major building blocks of organisms. Proteins combine to form parts of living organisms such as cell organelles, muscle fibers, enzymes, and hemoglobin.

In this lab, we will be focusing on the first three organic molecules mentioned above: carbohydrates, lipids, and proteins.

__PURPOSE:__ The purpose of this lab activity is to develop your skills in biochemistry, specifically while testing for the presence of organic compounds in food samples. You will use the techniques you learn in this lab to determine if organic compounds are present in a Happy Meal.

For a full description of the lab, download the file below. It contains all the handouts you'll need during the lab activity, including the Pre-Lab Questions, McMush Lab Data Sheet, and Post-Lab Questions.



Watch the following podcast to learn more about the lab.

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After completing the lab, we will watch the following video summary of the movie, "Supersize Me," to discover how regularly eating fast food can effect the human body.

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We will also look at Happy Meal Nutrition Facts to see how accurate our lab results were.



Click here for another McMush experiment you can try at home! (Click on the picture to enlarge it.)