This is the setup for the second trial of deuterium depleted water effects on plant growth. For the most part the experimental setup is identical to the first trial which you can find here. There are a few notable differences though so let’s run through the prep:

• 5 seeds of two differing varieties from The Tobacco Seed Company are used in each sample (trial 1 had 3 seeds per sample). I am using Dark Virginia and Virginia Gold #1 variety seeds.
• there are 5 different water types: 99.9% deuterium depleted water (ddw), deionized water (di water), tap water, 33% deuterium oxide (d2o) mixed with di water, and 33% d2o with ddw. The d2o mixtures are new additions to this experiment.
• The samples are stored in semi-micro cuvettes and sealed with a silicon top (maybe it’s rubber).
• The seeds are added to a cuvette and then 2.5ml of a water is added to the sample. This volume minimizes the air bubble in the sample to minimize hydrogen/deuterium exchange with the water.
• There are 10 samples of seeds and 10 more samples of seeds that are presoaked in their respective water buffers.
• Seed growth is tracked using a Nikon D40 DSLR with a 10x magnifying lens. The samples are arranged on some Thor Labs optomechanics to make image taking simpler.