It's 11am on a hot Tuesday morning in Karachi and two groups of students in the School of Nursing and Midwifery have coconuts and pomegranates in their hands. Pomegranate juice and coconut water are very popular refreshments in the city’s hot summers, but these students have something else on their minds.
As they step into the science laboratory of the School of Nursing and Midwifery for their biochemistry class, they’re considering how to design experiments to explore the chemical processes that drive the health benefits of coconuts and pomegranates.
One group of eight students is inspired by stories of how the clear liquid at the center of a coconut’s inner shell, coconut water, was used in medical emergencies during World War II. The story goes that coconut water was used to provide emergency blood transfusions and this resulted in the start of a three-month long experiment in which the group assessed the nutrients contained in coconut water. After extracting enough coconut water for their experiments, beakers of the fluid were put into test tubes and tested with a number of chemical solutions. The students then applied a range of tests to determine potassium, calcium, magnesium and glucose levels.
At the end of their experiments, they detected all four elements especially potassium and calcium which help the body’s muscles function, regulate blood pressure and reduce the likelihood of blood clots in the heart. They also detected the presence of glucose which is the body’s energy source. They concluded that the presence of electrolytes in coconut water meant that it could help restore the body’s mineral levels when the body has lost fluids due to perspiration or because of diseases like diarrhoea.
A second group of six students was intrigued by a popular practice in the northern areas of Pakistan of using pomegranate peels to treat flu, throat infections and sore throat. The group hypothesised that the peel of pomegranates may have anti-bacterial properties and hence explored whether chemicals in the peel could treat the effects of bacteria such as E.coli and S.auerus.
During the experiment, students crushed the peel of the fruit to extract a liquid. They then exposed the liquid from the pomegranate to bacterial cultures of E.coli and S.aureus by placing samples on an agar plate. These plates were then left in an incubator at the temperature of the human body to assess how the chemicals would interact over a period of time. After two days, students noted a zone of inhibition around the S.aureus culture suggesting that chemicals in the pomegranate had curbed the growth of the bacteria which is known to cause throat conditions.
After conducting follow-up tests to check their results they noticed the same results and also found that since no inhibition zone was formed for E.coli it was resistant to chemicals in the peel. They concluded that the peel of the pomegranate had anti-microbial properties that could counter the harmful health effects of the S.aureus bacterium.
Shehla Khan, assistant professor at the School of Nursing, supervised the two experiments and was pleased by the students’ work. “It is wonderful to see students excited about the process of research. They were so keen to explore chemical processes and their application to the body. This knowledge will benefit them in their clinical courses and will come in handy when they explore how their research can help communities around them,” Ms Khan said.
She also stated that including project-based assignments in the first-year biochemistry course helped expose students to the process of scientific inquiry process in a very interesting and challenging manner. Such experiments inculcate positive habits in learners such as assessing all the evidence before making statements based on science, Ms Khan added.
It's 11am on a hot Tuesday morning in Karachi and two groups of students in the School of Nursing and Midwifery have coconuts and pomegranates in their hands. Pomegranate juice and coconut water are very popular refreshments in the city’s hot summers, but these students have something else on their minds.
As they step into the science laboratory of the School of Nursing and Midwifery for their biochemistry class, they’re considering how to design experiments to explore the chemical processes that drive the health benefits of coconuts and pomegranates.
One group of eight students is inspired by stories of how the clear liquid at the center of a coconut’s inner shell, coconut water, was used in medical emergencies during World War II. The story goes that coconut water was used to provide emergency blood transfusions and this resulted in the start of a three-month long experiment in which the group assessed the nutrients contained in coconut water. After extracting enough coconut water for their experiments, beakers of the fluid were put into test tubes and tested with a number of chemical solutions. The students then applied a range of tests to determine potassium, calcium, magnesium and glucose levels.
At the end of their experiments, they detected all four elements especially potassium and calcium which help the body’s muscles function, regulate blood pressure and reduce the likelihood of blood clots in the heart. They also detected the presence of glucose which is the body’s energy source. They concluded that the presence of electrolytes in coconut water meant that it could help restore the body’s mineral levels when the body has lost fluids due to perspiration or because of diseases like diarrhoea.
A second group of six students was intrigued by a popular practice in the northern areas of Pakistan of using pomegranate peels to treat flu, throat infections and sore throat. The group hypothesised that the peel of pomegranates may have anti-bacterial properties and hence explored whether chemicals in the peel could treat the effects of bacteria such as E.coli and S.auerus.
During the experiment, students crushed the peel of the fruit to extract a liquid. They then exposed the liquid from the pomegranate to bacterial cultures of E.coli and S.aureus by placing samples on an agar plate. These plates were then left in an incubator at the temperature of the human body to assess how the chemicals would interact over a period of time. After two days, students noted a zone of inhibition around the S.aureus culture suggesting that chemicals in the pomegranate had curbed the growth of the bacteria which is known to cause throat conditions.
After conducting follow-up tests to check their results they noticed the same results and also found that since no inhibition zone was formed for E.coli it was resistant to chemicals in the peel. They concluded that the peel of the pomegranate had anti-microbial properties that could counter the harmful health effects of the S.aureus bacterium.
Shehla Khan, assistant professor at the School of Nursing, supervised the two experiments and was pleased by the students’ work. “It is wonderful to see students excited about the process of research. They were so keen to explore chemical processes and their application to the body. This knowledge will benefit them in their clinical courses and will come in handy when they explore how their research can help communities around them,” Ms Khan said.
She also stated that including project-based assignments in the first-year biochemistry course helped expose students to the process of scientific inquiry process in a very interesting and challenging manner. Such experiments inculcate positive habits in learners such as assessing all the evidence before making statements based on science, Ms Khan added.