Name: Micheal N. B.
Status: Educator
Age: 50s
Location: N/A
Country: N/A
Date: November 2003
Question:
A chicken egg with the shell removed with vinegar is used
as semipermeable membrane to demonstrate to students the movement of
water by osmosis. In addition to a concentrated sugar and distilled
water setup - I would like to include an isotonic setup. If sucrose is
used as the solute,
(1) are the sugar molecules large enough not to pass
into the egg, and
(2) what percent solution would make for an average
isotonic solution.
Replies:
I'm not sure about sugar, but a 5% salt solution is about isotonic to the inside of a chicken
egg. I use 20% salt as a hypertonic solution and distilled water as a hypotonic solution.
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