Osmosis and the Visking Tubing Essay Example

things. Osmosis is the basic movement of water through the cell membrane. Without osmosis, there will be an unequal content of solute and solvent in the cytoplasm and the cell will not survive.

Osmosis is also very important for the process of dialysis, which is where the blood is being filtered externally using a machine. It allows waste products and minerals to move in or out of the cell safely. There are many factors that are responsible for osmosis. The difference in concentration is obviously the main factor, however temperature also plays a big part in osmosis. This is because osmosis involves the movement of water molecules and by increasing the temperature, the water molescules will gain more energy and move across the semi-permeable membrane in a faster rate.

Another obvious factor is the surface area of the semi-permeable membrane. It is simple logic that if there is more surface area, more water molecules will be able to move across the membrane at one time. The factor the will be tested in this experiment is the difference in concentration and other factors are not taken into account. However these factors are used to explain any anomalies that will occur during the experiment in the evaluation section if necessary. Diffusion of water across a membrane - osmosis - generates a pressure called osmotic pressure.

If the pressure in the compartment into which water is flowing is raised to the equivalent of the osmotic pressure, movement of water will stop. This pressure is often called hydrostatic ('water-stopping') pressure. This shows that osmosis will only occur to a certain point until water molecules will stop

moving across the membrane due to equal osmotic pressure (both solutions has equal concentrations). Therefore this experiment will investigate one factor that affects osmosis which is the concentrations.