Lab 1

Exercise 1: Data Interpretation

Dissolved oxygen is oxygen that is trapped in a fluid, such as water. Since many living organism requires oxygen to survive, it is a necessary component of water systems such as streams, lakes and rivers in order to support aquatic life. The dissolved oxygen is measured in units of parts per million (ppm). Examine the data in Table 4 showing the amount of dissolved oxygen present and the number of fish observed in the body of water the sample was taken from; finally, answer the questions below.

|Table 4: Water Quality vs. Fish Population |

Dissolved Oxygen (ppm)024681012141618Number of Fish Observed01310121315101213

Questions

What patterns do you observe based on the information in Table 4?

The more fish that are observed in that area of water is proportional to the more dissolved oxygen in the water.

Develop a hypothesis relating to the amount of dissolved oxygen measured in the water sample and the number of fish observed in the body of water.

If there is more dissolved oxygen in the water will bring more fish to the area where they are taking the sample.

What would your experimental approach be to test this hypothesis?

I would start off by keeping a count of how many fish are in the area of the water where I took the sample of dissolved oxygen from in different areas and compare the results.

What would be the independent and dependent variables?

In this experiment the independent variable would be dissolved oxygen and the dependent variable would be the fish.

What would be your control?

In this specific experiment there would be no control due to the areas changing.

What type of graph would be appropriate for this data set? Why?

The type of graph that would be most appropriate for this experiment would be a line graph because it would provide clear results that change over a period of time or different areas we sampled....