Egg-citing Osmosis

Egg-citing Osmosis

Egg-citing Osmosis
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 5 to 7
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	5.2

Vocabulary

challenging words:

carbonate, circumference, passive, vacuole, membrane, calcium, movement, houseplants, dissolve, running, vinegar, roots, acid, region, wilt, actually

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Egg-citing Osmosis
By Cindy Grigg

¹ Osmosis is the movement of water from a region of high water concentration through a semi-permeable membrane to a region of low water concentration. Semi-permeable means that the membrane lets certain substances pass through it into and out of the cell. Osmosis is an important topic in biology because it is the main way that water is transported into and out of cells. Osmosis is a type of passive transport. The cell does not need to use any energy to carry out osmosis.

² Here is a great experiment to do at home. Start with a raw egg, an animal cell. Put it into a clear glass or plastic container. Pour in white vinegar until the egg is covered with the vinegar. Let the egg sit in the vinegar overnight. Next, take the egg out carefully and gently wash it under running water. The shell should be gone, and the membrane containing the egg is left. Vinegar is an acid, and it will dissolve the calcium carbonate of the shell. Measure the egg with a cloth tape measure. Handle the egg gently because it is easy to break the membrane, and your experiment will be over too soon. Write down the circumference of the egg so you don't forget it. Rinse out the vinegar container and dry it. Carefully put the egg back into the container. Pour in enough white syrup to cover the egg. Wait two days. Now, look into the container. What do you see?

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