Can everyone please add their thoughts on how to supply free radicals to an artificial environment. The experiment is the effects of antioxidants and free radicals on seed germination. I had 10 mL of hydrogen peroxide (free radical), the antioxidant, and thirty radish seeds in a petri dish, and observed the amount of seeds that germinated. Would there be an alternate way to supplying a free radical for this experiment? Doesn't matter if I have to change the environment (petri dish) to something else, as long as I get the free radical. I was thinking possibly electrolysis to obtain the oxygen free radical, but how would I maintain the oxygen free radical in the petri dish with the antioxidant (liquid form) and radish seeds? Thanks everyone.
You don't need to "supply" the free radicals in the sense your talking about. You can just generate the free radicals from the water inside the organism using UV radiation as ElectricFetus says below for example.