The Effect Cost-Differing Contact Solutions Have on Bacteria on Contact Lenses

The purpose of this experiment was to determine if the cost of contact solution was significant in the cleanliness of the contact lenses after bacteria is added to them. We hypothesized that if contacts infected with 10-µL of E Coli are cleaned with two price ranges of eye contact solution, cheap and expensive, then the expensive solution will eliminate the most bacteria colonies. First, we incubated our E Coli bacteria to concentrate it. Then, we dipped each individual contact into the solution, which was placed into its own specified contact solution and sat overnight. The next day, we dipped each contact into its own 1mL of distilled water, and then poured that water into the Petri dish with agar. After several days, we counted the total number of bacteria colonies present in the Petri dish. Some had to be discarded because they did not produce colonies, but rather they grew a lawn of bacteria. We preformed a 2-sample t-test on the resulting data to compare the efficiency of both solutions. Through our test we concluded that we could reject our hypothesis, meaning that there was no significant difference in the solutions. In our case, the price did not matter for the experiment we tested.

Research Done By:

Christina Daya
Sterling Heights High School

Jill Milczarski
Warren Mott High School

Cassie Renaud
Lakeview High School

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