The last science project we have done is to create a research proposal video showing how to clone plants. I was in a group with Adlih and Daniel, and we grew dandelion clones. The goal of this project was to learn the differences between sexually and asexually grown plants and how we can use those techniques for real-life purposes. We decided to grow dandelions to use as all natural plant-based laxatives. These would be useful for people with allergies or sensitivities to many chemicals commonly used in medicinal products and would be healthier and free of toxins. We first had to grow our clones, which we did by cutting the stems off of a healthy plant and then replanting it separately.
Out of our 4 dandelion plants, only one of them sprouted, which you can see above. The next step was to start writing, researching, filming, and finally editing our video. Our experimentation of dandelions helped us to understand how dandelions with strong genes can be used through cloning to create a healthier plant. The way we would use these plants for medicinal purposes is to combine the best dandelions together to make the plants stronger.
These fundamental results lead us to realize that dandelions can, in fact, be cloned asexually, and can benefit our society every single day. We plan to use the cloned dandelions to make them reproduce sexually, and produce many many more plants. Once we have many plants we can pick the ones that look like they have a benefit over the rest, such as thicker leaves, and clone them to have the “most likely to survive” dandelions. My research group and I are specifically looking for thicker fuller leaves to produce a whole new natural take on laxatives. Dandelion leaves are high in fiber, vitamin C and B6, potassium, calcium, and iron. Fiber is one of the main things prescribed when constipated, so have it these leaves will help enormously with your bowel movement.
To complete this project we would need money, so let me explain what we need money for exactly. We need $600 to purchase dandelions to start our sexual reproduction process. We would need to buy a greenhouse to keep our dandelions at a common temperature, for a better outcome, this would cost $400. To keep the dandelions watered, we would need to purchase an irrigation system, this would cost around $50. All of the people helping with this experiment would be volunteering so you would not have to pay for our hours. We need to buy medical grade scissors, to cut the roots precisely, for a proper cloning, these would cost $50. To complete our asexual reproduction of the dandelions, we would need to purchase a beehive to hold the bees, this would cost $2000, including all of our suits. Now we would need to purchase 2 Nucs of bees, we need 2 Nucs because our greenhouse is quite big, and we need to incorporate the number of bees that will not survive, this will cost $600. To finish off our experiment we will need to purchase 10 blenders, to blend the leaves to a pulp and create a much more edible and healthy laxative.
Our first stage of this experiment is to grow dandelions, (asexually). Our second stage is to eliminate the poorly growing dandelions, and replace them with clones of the thicker leaved ones. We will continue this process for a while until we eliminate all the weak dandelions. Our final step is to collect all the thick and healthy leaves, and we plan to blend them all, into a pulp and create a healthier alternative to laxatives!
Here is our final proposal video! I hope you will consider funding our project!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLYIbq8JOYc