Some of the most interesting science is in your kitchen!

You can find a

fascinating variety of life: mold, yeast, and mushrooms, all grouped together
as fungi. In this article we’ll look at ways you can find out more about these
organisms.

For any experiment, there’s a key that can be really helpful. Have you heard of
the scientific method? Basically, you start with a question, like “what happens
to this if I add that?” Then based on what you read about a topic, come up with
a hypothesis, a prediction of what you expect to happen in certain conditions.
Next, you can experiment to find out if your hypothesis is right! For the most
accurate results, you need to control the experiment’s variables (for a mold-
growing project like these, include type of bread, room temperature, and
amount of light). Be sure to use at least one “normal” piece as your control, so
you have a standard for comparison.

Once you’ve completed the experimentation stage, look at your predictions

again. Do you need to do more research and change anything, based on your
results?

What Are Fungi?

There are five “kingdoms” of living organisms: plants, animals, fungi, and tiny
bacteria and protozoa. Mushrooms, molds, and yeasts are all in the fungi
kingdom. Although sometimes they look similar to plants, fungi do not
produce their own food through photosynthesis. Fungi range in size from just
one tiny cell to several inches tall.

Fungi are important decomposers, eating up dead leaves and other rotting
organic material. Unlike when you eat and your food is digested (broken down
into tiny parts) inside your body, fungi digest their food outside of their bodies
and then absorb it into their cells. Fungi have many different means of
reproduction, but all are able to reproduce by forming spores, which are
spread out and develop into more fungi.

Many fungi are harmful, causing diseases like athlete’s foot and Dutch elm
disease (in trees). But some fungi can also be used for saving lives. Perhaps
the greatest use of fungi is in the treatment of bacterial diseases that used to
be deadly, such as scarlet fever and pneumonia. Starting in the late 1920s,
scientists discovered that a type of mold, Penicillium notatum, prevented the
growth of some bacteria. They created an effective antibiotic, called penicillin,
to treat bacterial diseases.

Growing Mold
As you know if you’ve ever left bread or fruit on the counter for too long, mold
is easy to grow! This is because mold produces a lot of spores and they
spread easily. All you need to grow mold is 1-2 pieces of bread and some
scraps like fruit peels, carrot shavings, or coffee grounds.

Mold needs light and oxygen to grow. They also do best at room temperature.
Based on what you’ve found out about mold, what do you expect to be the
best environment in your house for growing it? What about the worst? How do
you think heat and cold will affect growth?

As you experiment with mold, follow these safety rules! Do not touch mold or
bacterial growth with bare hands. (Use gloves if you want to touch the mold.)
Be sure to wash your hands with soap and water after holding a moldy
specimen, even if you don’t touch the mold directly.

In this experiment you’ll compare mold growth on bread and on other food at
the same time. First, get four pieces of bread (or divide two in half). Splash
each of the pieces with water to dampen but not soak them. Place each piece
in an individual plastic bag. Don’t seal the bags completely, so some air can
still get inside. Now place two of the bags in a spot where they will get some
sunlight. Place the other two in a spot where they will get less light, but the
temperature is about the same as in the other spot.

Next, put the food scraps (either all the same kind or a mixture) on two paper
plates. Set one next to the first set of bread specimens and the other next to
the bread in the darker spot.

After 2-4 days you should see some spots of mold growing. Mold spores grow
on stalks, kind of like mushrooms but on a smaller scale. These raised spores
are what give mold on food a fuzzy appearance. Mold is usually blackish on
starchy foods like bread, and a fuzzier blue or green on fruit.

Wait a couple more days until there’s a large area of mold on the food. Which
set of bread has the most growth on it, the one in the light or the one in the
dark? What about the scraps? Do some scraps have more mold than others?

As you discuss what you see, you might also want to write down your
observations and make sketches. Use a magnifying glass or a microscope, if
you have one, to look at the mold spores close up. What do you see? (To view
under a microscope, use a sharp knife to carefully scoop up some of the mold
and set it on a microscope slide. Look at the mold under low and then high
power.)

For further study, come up with your own experiments that help answer the
following questions: Which foods are most susceptible to mold, ones high in
starch or high in protein? What difference does the presence of sugars make?
If mold grows best in a slightly acidic environment (5-6 pH), how might you
make it grow faster? Think about what foods are more acidic; for instance,
vinegar and lemon juice are highly acidic at 2-3 pH, while apples have an
acidity of 3-4 pH.

How Can You Prevent Mold Growth?

Almost every processed food has some kind of preservative in it, to keep it
from spoiling. White bread usually has far more preservatives than regular
wheat bread. Fruit and vegetables are harder to preserve, although often
apples are coated in a thin protective wax. Refrigeration often keeps food
preserved for at least several days, because the cold temperature inhibits
mold and bacteria growth.

Use the peelings from 2-3 apples, pears, or oranges for this experiment. Put an
even amount of peels on four paper plates and set them in a place with some
sunlight. Now sprinkle about a teaspoon of salt over the peels on one plate,
and label the plate “salt.” Do the same for another set, but this time with sugar.
For the last one, choose your own “preservative” – it might be from the spice
rack or it could be a mild household cleaner from under the sink! Which set of
treated peels do you expect to be most resistant to mold growth? Which do
expect to have the most growing on it? Observe mold growth on each after 2-3
days. Look again each day after that for the rest of the week. How does the
mold compare on each? Was it how you predicted it would be?

Yeast Experiment

Have you ever made bread? For non-sweet breads, usually you have to mix
active dry yeast with water and then mix it with dough and let it rise. The yeast
breaks down sugar molecules in the dough and converts it to carbon dioxide
(CO2) gas, alcohol (which evaporates as the bread cooks), and water. The
CO2 is what causes the bread dough to rise. Look at a piece of bread,
homemade or store-bought. Do you see the “holes” in it? These are caused by
bubbles of CO2 from the yeast.

What difference does temperature make to yeast growth? Test this by adding a
teaspoon of active dry yeast to a cup of cold water and a teaspoon to a cup of
warm (but not boiling) water. Observe them both. How does the yeast act in
each? Use your eyes and your nose! In the warm water, the yeast turns slightly
foamy almost instantly and gives off a strong “fermenting” smell. As they
begin to reproduce, the round yeast cells begin to dissolve in 1-2 minutes and
form a thick, sticky coating on the water. Stir the yeast into the water and see
what happens. It will form globs of yeast that stick to the spoon. Now compare
the yeast in the cold water. In the same amount of time, it will also form a
coating on the water’s surface, but without looking dissolved. You’ll still see
lots of dry yeast on top, and when you stir the water, the yeast is not so sticky.
In the beginning, there’s also less of a smell, as the spores take longer to
begin fermenting. From this, you might conclude (correctly) that yeast is most
active in a warm environment!