Posted on: 10/10/2025Latest News
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Posted on: October 6th 2025
Strawberry Science comes to WHS!
Year 7 students are developing their practical skills in science lessons and have discovered that DNA, the very essence of life can be extracted from the cells of strawberries.
Strawberries are perfect for this science investigation because their cells are very easy to break down and they contain huge amounts of DNA.
The first stage of this experiment could be mistaken for making strawberry jam! The strawberries are mashed up in a mortar and pestle to create a pulp. This process breaks the cell membranes so that the DNA is released from the cell.
The pulp is then mixed up with washing-up liquid, salt and water.
The washing-up liquid helps to break down the cell membranes and nuclear membranes; The salt helps the DNA clump together to help the separation process.
The next stage was to filter the mixture.
This process removed the large solid pieces of strawberry leaving a liquid that contains the DNA.
Cold ethanol is then added to the filtered mixture and it formed a layer on top of the strawberry liquid. DNA does not dissolve in alcohol, so it separates from the rest of the mixture.
A white, stringy or cloudy substance appears between the layers; this is strawberry DNA!
The students then collected the DNA from the mixture.
It is possible to collect human DNA in a similar way using cheek cells but do not try this at home!!
