IA ideas · Chemistry
Maths IA ideas for chemistry students
Chemistry is full of rates: how fast something decays, dissolves, cools or is cleared from the body. Those rates lead to exponential and logistic models and, at HL, to differential equations you can solve and test against data.
The ideas below keep the focus on the mathematics of change. Several can be run with safe experiments at home or in school; others use published data.
Accessible (3)
Solid (5)
- Does caffeine build up if you drink coffee every few hours?AA SLAA HLAI SLAI HLSolid
- How long would a lake take to flush out a pollutant?AA HLAI HLSolid
- Modelling bacterial growth in the biology labAA SLAA HLAI SLAI HLSolid
- Modelling the Keeling curve: trend plus seasonsAA SLAA HLAI SLAI HLSolid
- How long does a bottle take to drain? Testing Torricelli's lawAA SLAA HLAI SLAI HLSolid
Ambitious (1)
Frequently asked questions
Can I base my Maths IA on a chemistry experiment?
Yes, if the IA is about the mathematics of the results: deriving and testing a model. Check with your school whether you may use the same data as another IA.
Which chemistry IA suits SL?
Radioactive decay with dice, cooling curves and caffeine build-up need exponential functions and sequences, which are in both SL courses.
Which suits HL?
Pollutant flushing and caffeine doses lead to differential equations: AA HL can solve them analytically, AI HL can use slope fields and Euler's method.
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