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Title: Both plant cells and animal cells will swell if placed in a hypotonic solution. Post by: colleen on Aug 16, 2012 Both plant cells and animal cells will swell if placed in a hypotonic solution. However, only the animal cell will burst. Why?
Title: Re: Both plant cells and animal cells will swell if placed in a hypotonic solution. Post by: bio_man on Aug 17, 2012 Water will enter both cells due to osmosis. In the animal cell, water will continue to enter as long as the extracellular solution is hypotonic, causing the pliable animal cell membrane to eventually break and the cell to burst. The stiff cell wall found in plant cells but not animal cells will not expand indefinitely. At some point, as the cytoplasm of the plant cell expands, the cell wall will exert a back pressure on the cell. Further water uptake will be prevented and the plant cell will not burst.
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