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The Effect of Osmosis on Potato Cells

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The Effect of Osmosis on Potato Cells
Page 1: Homepage

Page 2: Contents

Page 3: Introduction

Pages 4 – 7: Preliminary Experiment

Pages 8 - 14: Main Experiment

Introduction

In this experiment I am going to investigate the effect of varying concentration of a differing glucose solution on the amount of osmotic activity, between the solution and a potato tuber of a given size. The purpose of this experiment is to demonstrate how living cells rely on osmosis, the diffusion of water. Osmosis is the movement of water molecules (H20) from a region in which they are highly concentrated to a region in which they are less concentrated. This movement must take place across a partially permeable membrane such as a cell wall, which lets smaller molecules, such as water, through but does not allow bigger molecules, such as glucose, to do so. The molecules will continue to diffuse until the area in which they are found reaches a state of equilibrium, meaning that the molecules are randomly distributed throughout an object, with no area having a higher or lower concentration than another.

Investigation – Preliminary Experiment

Strategy

In my preliminary experiment I am going to be seeing how potato tubers react when placed in of 0m (distilled water) 0.5m and 1m (glucose solution). I am doing this to gain some knowledge about how the potato tubers will be affected; so when I do my main experiment I will have basic knowledge on what will happen, this means I will be able to spot outliers more easily and learn from any mistakes which may have been made in the preliminary.

Molar = (m)
Mass/weight = (g)

Depending on certain factors the osmotic activity between the potato tuber and glucose solution will either increase, decrease, or unaffect the mass of the potato, such as – whether the sugar to water ratio inside the potato and outside of the potato differ

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