Question

What is osmosis? Explain the experiment with a diagram.

Answer 1

Hint: Sugar solution has high concentration and water has low concentration. Potatoes act as semipermeable membranes . Osmosis takes place in plants ,the human body , some drugs after administration in the body etc.

Complete answer:
Osmosis is the net movement of solvent molecules through a partially permeable membrane into a neighbourhood of upper solute concentration, in order to equalize the solute concentrations on the 2 sides.
Osmosis refers to the method of movement of solvent molecules from lower Concentration to higher concentration across a semipermeable membrane.

The process can be explained by a simple experiment :
Requirements - peeled potato, knife, sugar solution, petri dish, dil.water, pins, title
Procedure-
1.Take the potato and place it on the title .
2.Take a knife and cut both ends of the potato so that they become flat
3.Using a knife make a cavity in the potato on the flat surface approximately till another end
4.Take distilled water on a Petri plate ( half fill).
5.Place the potato in the Petri plate which is half-filled with water.
6.Now take a sugar solution and fill half in the cavity of potato which is placed in distilled water.
7.Make the mark with the pin up to where the sugar solution is filled.
8.Potatoes act as an osmometer.
9.Leave it for two hours without disturbing.
10.Mark the rise in the level of the sugar solution with another pin.
Observation : The rise in sugar solution is due to the absorption of water from petri dishes through a semipermeable membrane(potato cell).
Conclusion : The movement of water inside the potato occurs due to the difference in the concentration of sugar solution and water.

Note: 1.The cavity should be deep enough so that there is a thin layer of tissue at the base of the potato
2.The concentration of sugar solution should be more than the concentration in potato and water both .