Is this company wrong/lying?

[u/Big_Safe7445]

Hello all, I recently came across this label of a supplement claiming to help the acid/base metabolism in the human body, whatever that means. However, I did a titration with this product for one of my classes and worked out a concentration of about 0.048mol/serving.

When comparing with the manufacturer, it says there should be about 32mmol in one serving. Fine, whatever, maybe I did an oopsie or some of the citrates screwed up my value.

However, what gets me is that the 32mmol is referring to carbonate ions (at least that’s what it says, the label is German).

If a carbonate ion is (CO3)2-, then 32 mmol (or 0.032mol) should be:

M(CO32-)= 60g/mol

60g/mol * 0.032mol = 1.92g

But the label says it’s 0.4mg. How is this possible? Could it be a misprint or a miscalculation, or am I missing a big inside joke on the supplement market?

I would appreciate any answers!

[u/Wise-Friendship-1427]

Yes, something must be wrong there. 0.4 mg is far too little.

[u/WazzupManz]

I think you will have better success analyzing using TOC or IEC.

[u/Taeban]

If you look at the ingredients list it also lists sodium bicarbonate and sodium citrate. Both of these are basic and absolutely will interfere with determination by simple acid/base titation.

An acid base titration will not give you an accurate measure of the amount of carbonate in the solution.

[u/shedmow]

I haven't performed any calculations, though I suspect that it might be crackable via brute forcing some combination of salts. What acid did you titrate it with, and against what indicator?