Question

A red blood cell has an internal salt concentration of 150mM. The cell is placed in a beaker of 500mM salt.(a) Assuming that the cell membrane is permeable to water but not to ions, decribe what will happen to the cell in terms of osmosis.
(b) If the membrane were permeable to ions, in which direction wou;ld solutes diffuse: into the cell or out of the cell?

Answer 1

Answer:

a) water will move from the cell into the beaker acroas the cell membrane

b) solutes will diffuse into the cell

Explanation:

a) Osmosis is the phenomenon that describes the movement of water from a region of low solute concentration (high water concentration) to a region of high solute concentration (low water concentration) across a semi-permeable membrane. In this case, since the inside of the cell contains a lesser concentration of solute (150mm), water containing dissolved solutes will move osmotically into the solution of the beaker, which has a higher concentration of solute (500mM) via the cell membrane (semi-permeable membrane).

b) Diffusion involves the movement of particles or molecules from a region where they are highly concentrated to a region where they are less concentrated. In this case, solutes/ions will diffuse from the beaker (outside the cell) containing 500mM of solute INTO THE CELL containing 150mM of solute.