Potato Tuber Lab Essay

IntroductionOsmosis is a form of diffusion in which water diffuses finished a selectively permeable membrane from a region of soaring concentration to a region of raze concentration. This form of diffusion takes place when the molecules in high concentration are too large to move through the membrane. Three factors that determine cellular phone membrane permeability are shape, size, and polarity. For this experiment, it must be kept in mind that saccharose is not permeable to the cell membrane, for it is too large to pass through. The cell membrane functions to protect, separate, and regulate what goes in and out of a cell. It also allows cells to control their internal chemical environment and the availableness of important materials. In a hypertonic solution, there is a greater concentration of solute inside a cell compared to another solution (water will work from out of the white white potato vine cells and the mass will decrease). In a hypotonic solution, there is a lowe r concentration of solute compared to another solution (water will lean into the potato cells and the mass will increase).In this potato tuber lab experiment, the weight of each potato tuber after being sliced into disregard disks and rinsed was taken and recorded. The potato disks were then individually placed in sucrose solutions for exactly an hour, each cup being swirled every ten minutes. At the suppress of the hour, each group of potato tuber slices was weighed a second time to determine if there was a change in mass due to the sucrose solution. The percent change in weight among the different potato tubings was determined in order to confirm or deny our hypotheses.My null hypothesis was that the potato would not be affected by the sucrose solution, the osmotic concentration would neither increase nor decrease, therefore there would be no change in mass seen. My alternate hypothesis was that the potato would be affected by the sucrose solution (final mass) by having a highe r or a lower osmotic concentration than the initial mass, therefore there will be a change in mass seen.ResultsThe initial weight of the sliced potato tubers ranged from 4.4g to 5.4g. The final weight of the sliced and soaked potato tubers ranged from 3.6g to 5.7g. These results show that the 0.1 solution of sucrose was hypotonic, causing the sliced potato pieces to gain mass, as to where the remaining solutions of sucrose (.00, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5) were hypertonic, causing the sliced potato pieces to lose mass. This shows that the potato tubers were affected by the sucrose solutions. This conclusion is represented in the graph given below.DiscussionThe aspire of this experiment was to determine the osmotic concentration of sucrose within the potato tuber slices. Upon coming up with the final results of the experiment, the osmotic concentration of sucrose was reason to be .06M. For this experiment, an isotonic solution will have a molarity of .06M, as the best fit line hits the x a xis at .06M. In comparison, a hypotonic solution will have a concentration ranging from 0 M to .06M, and a hypertonic solution will have a concentration ranging from .06M or higher. This caused me to accept the alternate hypothesis and reject the null hypothesis therefore, the potato was affected by the sucrose solution as we proverb a change in mass of the potato tuber slices.