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Kinetics Excel Tutorial

The Excel software program allows a user to perform statistical analyses of scientific data. The program performs different mathematical functions and plots the results in different graphical formats. A user should review a tutorial to familiarize himself with the Excel software program in order to create kinetic analysis calculations and graphs. There are multiple calculations and types of kinetics experiments that can be performed in Excel; however, understanding how to perform basic statistical analysis and how to create a chart can help a user perform any of the functions.

Things You'll Need

Excel

Instructions

Excel Kinetics Tutorial
- 1
  Open the Excel software program on your computer. Enter the titles for any columns or rows for your spreadsheet. Adjust the width of the columns as needed using the Format tab. A dialog box will appear for the column width adjustment. Enter the data in the columns as necessary.
- 2
  Perform statistical analysis on the data. There are multiple statistical functions available for kinetics laboratory analysis. For instance, if you have the absorbance levels of a particular substance at different time intervals and you want to calculate the average absorbance, highlight the absorbance column and go to the function button located next to the data entry tab. The function button resembles a cursive "f." The function button will open a dialog box with different statistical tools. Select "Average." Click "OK." There are multiple functions that you can perform, such as student's t-test, correlation and ANOVA. Perform as needed.
- 3
  Enter your own calculations for a kinetics laboratory, such as Beer's law equation. In order to obtain the concentration of a substance if the absorbance is measured, the calculation is absorbance divided by molar absorptivity. For instance, blue dye's molar absorptivity is 138000. To obtain the concentration, select an empty cell and hit the function button. Type in the equation, A2/138000. A2 represents the column and row of the absorbance measurement. The result will appear in the empty cell. Repeat for each absorbance. You can also copy and paste the equation as needed for each row of absorbance measurements.
- 4
  Create a graph of your data. Make sure that your X axis data is located to the left of the Y axis data. If you are plotting time versus absorbance, time would be the X axis data and absorbance measurements would be Y axis data. Highlight the data and go to the Chart tab. Select the type of chart you want to use, such as line or scattered plot. Options will prompt for the chart title and X and Y axis titles. Format the chart using the format option. Change the color of the font or background as needed.

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