Laboratory Activity 4

Diffusion and Osmosis

OSMOSIS IN LIVING TISSUES

Materials:
Potatoes, water, petri-dish (plates), salt, sugar.

Procedure:
1. Cut three potatoes into half and scoop out some material from the center to make a
cavity in each half.
2. place three potato halves in boiling water for 2-3 few minutes to kill the cytoplasm.
3. place each half of 6 potatoes in plates three-fourths of which is filled with tap water.
4. for potato 1, place half teaspoon of salt in the cavities of the raw and the boiled halves.
Using sugar, do the same for potato 2. Potato 3 will serve as your control group.
5. observe the potatoes after 2-3 hours.

Report Sheet
A. Data and Results
Name of the Experiment: OSMOSIS IN LIVING TISSUES Observation:

Potato Response of tissues to substance

salt sugar none
1 boiled Remain as it is
raw Filled with water
2 boiled Filled with water
raw Filled with water
3 boiled No water
raw No water

= After 2 hours of observing, in potato 1, the salt in the boiled potato remain as it is while
in the raw potato it is filled with water. Then, in potato 2 the sugar in both raw and boiled
is filled with water. The potato 3 serve as a control group, there is no reaction at all in
both raw and boiled potato.

Conclusion:
In this experiment, the cavities of two of the raw and boiled potatoes are filled with salt
and sugar. The other potatoes, boiled and raw, are left empty. When the potatoes are
observed after 2 hours, in the potato 1, the salt of raw potato has dissolved in water,
whereas the salt in the boiled potato has remained solid and has not dissolved in water.
In the potato 2, wherein the sugar in both raw and boiled potato has been dissolved in
water. In this case, salt and sugar in the raw and boiled potato drains out water from the
cells lining the cavity due to osmosis. The cells at the outermost layer absorb water from
the tray. In potato 1, the boiled potato did not take place osmosis because the semi
permeable membrane of the potato cells was destroyed by boiling which did not allow
movement of water into the salt molecules. Then in the potato 3, as there is no salt and
sugar, the cells do not develop sufficient osmotic pressure to draw in water.

Diffusion

Materials:
Plain unflavored gelatin, petri dish (cups or Tupperware), straw and food coloring.

Procedure:
1. Add 4 packs of plain, unflavored gelatin (1 oz or 28 gm) to 4 cups of boiling water.
2. Pour the liquid gelatin into petri dishes, cups, or Tupperware and let it harden.
3. Then, using a straw, poke a hole or two in the gelatin, removing the plug so that
you have a hole in the jello about 1/2 inch deep.
4. Add a drop of food coloring in the hole in the jello.

Every so often, measure the circle of food coloring as it diffuses into the jello around it.
How many cm per hour is it diffusing? If you put one plate in the refrigerator and an
identical one at room temperature, do they diffuse at the same rate? Why do you think
you see more than one color for certain shades of food coloring?
= The gelatin inside the refrigerator and at a room temperature did not diffuse at the
same rate because of they have different temperature.

Observation:
After 4 hours, the food coloring in the gelatin at a room temperature diffuses slowly while
the gelatin that is inside the refrigerator diffuses much slower.

Conclusion:
In this experiment, the temperature is one of the factors affecting the rate of diffusion.
The greater the temperature, the more energy particles have, and when particles have a
lot of energy, they travel and vibrate much faster, increasing the rate of diffusion.