Potato Battery Experiment with Hypothesis and Conclusion

Instructions

• 1

  Mark Your Potatoes

  
  Start by marking the potatoes ‘1’ and ‘2’ using a dark permanent marker. This will help you better understand the following instructions.
• 2

  Nail Them

  
  Begin with inserting one galvanized nail into each potato, pushing them half way inside. Now insert one copper nail into each potato, making sure that they are as far away as possible from the galvanized nails. This distance between these two nails is what will generate the electrical charge.
• 3

  Empty the Clock

  
  Now take the battery operated LCD clock and remove the batteries while making note of the positive and negative terminals.
• 4

  Attach the Alligators

  
  Take one wire with alligator clips and connect one end to the copper nail in potato ‘1’ and the other end with the positive terminal in the LCD clock’s battery compartment.
  
  Now take another wire and connect it with the galvanized nail in potato ‘2’ using one end and the clock’s negative terminal with the other.
  
  The third alligator clip wire will connect the galvanized nail from potato ‘1’ with the copper nail in potato ‘2’, completing the circuit.
• 5

  Check Your Clock

  
  Your basic LCD clock should now be working on potato power. How cool is that?
• 6

  Troubleshooting

  
  -If your clock isn’t running, check the alligator clips and the connections properly. Your clips should not be touching any part of the clock’s battery compartment other than the terminals.
  
  -Sometimes a potato might not produce enough energy and your clock might require a high power battery, try switching clocks and potatoes.
  
  -If you want to verify whether your potato battery is producing energy, connect the alligator clips from the battery compartment with a multimeter.
• 7

  Potato Battery Experiment Conclusion

  
  Each potato basically functions like a "galvanic cell", which releases energy (in the form of electricity) as a result of chemical reactions. The potato as a whole becomes the cell casing, its juice works as a conductor or electrolyte, allowing the flow of charged ions, and the phosphoric acid naturally present in potatoes provides the hydrogen ions (H+) for the chemical reaction.