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fishhunter8 fishhunter8
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11 years ago
this is on my test/homework. cant figure it out. please help
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11 years ago
Osmotic pressure is caused when there is pressure exerted on a membrane because of a differential ability of ions to pass-a differential in the concentrations of solute.
What this means is, for example, if you have a membrane that allows water to pass, but not salt-on one side you have pure water, on the other, you have salt water.  Because of the second law of thermodynamics, the two sides *want* to have the same salt concentration-so water molecules will move from the pure water side to the saltwater side, trying to dilute the saltwater (trying to equalize the amount of salt in each side).  This will obviously put pressure on the membrane, because now there will be more fluid on one side than the other.
Turgor pressure merely refers to the pressue exerted inside a living cell, caused by the osmostic pressure described above.  Cells may have higher salt concentrations than surrounding fluid, and thus fluid flows into the cell-this creates pressure on the cell, because the membrane (or cell wall) will keep the cell from expanding too far.
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