Natural Sciences: Create an Experiment on Cow's Milk - Assignment Example

The Effect on the use of Pesticide on Cow’s Milk Part I On average, I/we use this number of bottled waters each day: One On average, I/we eat some form of meat (fish, chicken, etc.) for this many meals each day: Two On average, I/we bring in this many homemade lunches to work/school each week: Three On average, 0% of my groceries each week are certified organic. Bottled water has a significant effect on the environment that is often underestimated. There is a trend towards drinking bottled water currently, with many people buying several bottles throughout the day. The idea is that this is either safer or healthier than water from the tap, which may be true in some cases. Whether this is true or not, the environmental cost to the prevalent habit of drinking bottled water, especially buying many small bottles of water in the course of the day, is high. The plastic bottles that water is sold in are not biodegradable, and those that are not recycled end up in landfill for many decades, taking up space and contributing to the growing problem of waste from our society. Even when the bottles are recycled there is significant energy that goes into this process, and often also burning of fossil fuels to power the machines that are involved. This has a negative effect on the atmosphere. A better alternative is to buy large bottles of water less often, or refill bottles wherever possible. Part II Hypothesis The hypothesis for this experiment is that cow’s milk that is produced by cows which were fed with pesticide treated food is not significantly chemically different than cows that have been fed the same food that is not pesticide treated. Introduction Pesticides are widely used to control the insects that feed on crops such as wheat, grasses, corn and other commercial crops. Their use allows the crops to grow free from the influence of the pests, which can reduce crop yield. Consequently, the use of pesticides has allowed for the cheaper production of food both for human and for animal consumption (Chauhan & Singhal, 2006). Their use has also significantly increased from historic levels, and they are now used in large quantities worldwide (de la Riva & Anadon, 1991) However, one of the problems with the use of pesticides is that their effect is generally only tested on the crop itself and on those that eat it rather than any downstream effects. Many of the crops that are treated with pesticides are eaten by animals, such as grazing cattle, processed and then waste is excreted. One source of concern is surrounding grazing cows and how the pesticides are processed in their body. Research indicates that the way that cows process their food may result in a significant concentration of pesticides or chemicals derived from pesticides in the milk produced by cows that have eaten food treated with pesticides (Kampire et al., 2011). Methods This experiment will use cows that are fed on the same type of feed, for one group the feed will have been treated with pesticides and in the other case they will not have been. It is experimental and between five and ten populations of cows will be used for each group. The group that has no pesticide in their feed is the control group, while the other is the treatment group. The advantage of choosing multiple groups of cows for each treatment is that it ensures and differences observed are a consequence of the treatment, rather than a consequence of differences between the populations. For this study the independent variable (IV) is the feed, which will be either pesticide treated or non-pesticide treated, and the dependant variable (DV) is the cow’s milk and the concentration of pesticide residues within it. Where possible other variables were held constant, such as the type of cow, type of feed, type of environment the cows were subjected to. To ensure no confounding factors, between five and ten groups of cows were used for each treatment. Two sources of feed will be used, one pesticide treated and if possible these will be obtained from the same farm or manufacturer to ensure consistency. All animals in the control treatment will have the same feed as one another regardless of group, and all animals in the treatment will have the same feed as one another, regardless of group. Milk will be collected from the cows for a period of two weeks following feeding to allow for how long chemicals take to process from the gut into the milk. The milk will be analyzed chemically in the laboratory, using various chemical techniques including chromatography, spectrum analysis and testing for the presence of specific insecticide residues that are commonly observed. The differences and similarities between the control and treatment groups will be analyzed and the results will be compared to the hypothesis. Statistical analysis will involve running paired-t tests for each chemical or difference detected, to determine whether any of the differences are significant. If there is significant difference between the control group and the treatment group in terms of the chemical composition of the milk or the way it behaves in tests, then the null hypothesis will be rejected and it will be determined that the use of pesticides in feed has a significant effect on the composition of cow’s milk. The concentrations of the chemicals found will also allow for determination of whether this is likely to be harmful, by comparison with literature. References Chauhan, R., & Singhal, L. (2006). Harmful effects of pesticides and their control through cowpathy. International Journal of Cow Science, 2(1), 61–70. de la Riva, C., & Anadon, A. (1991). Organochlorine Pesticides in Cow's Milk from Agricultural Region in Northwestern Spain. Environmental Contamination and Toxicology 46, 527-553. Kampire, E., Kiremire, B. T., Nyanzi, S. A., & Kishimba, M. (2011). Organochlorine pesticide in fresh and pasteurized cow's milk from Kampala markets. Chemosphere. Read More