Strawberry Milkshake

*backblip

NOT. I took this while I was working at my first lab job. The container was filled with a solution (a mixture of different things) and I was in the process of purifying the proteins from the solution. The colour looks really pretty, just like a strawberry smoothie or milkshake, but trust me, one whiff and you could discern that it was NOT...

I blacked out the label to prevent any infringement on company policies.

Warning: Science Ahead


I was purifying the proteins via salt precipitation. Different things have different capacities to dissolve in a liquid. Salts are usually very soluble (dissolve easily) in polar solvents*, so when a high amount of salt is added to a solution, anything that dissolves less easily than the salt in the liquid component will be forced out, causing precipitation (formation of a solid). The general effect is known as "salting out".

*A polar solvent is a liquid comprised of molecules that do not have an even distribution of charge, like water. 

Sorry, this part might be too confusing. It's not really necessary to be able to understand the explanation, but I wanted it to be there for the sake of scientific correctness. Therefore, I had to clarify it, too...