Potato Osmosis Lab Report

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Osmosis lab - Russell Koh 12.6 T14! ! Aim! In this investigation you will be calculating the concentration of the cytoplasm in potato cells.! ! Variables:! Independent variable! Concentration of sugar solution(mol)! ! Dependent variable! The percentage change in mass of the potato after the experiment is over. (%grams)! ! Controlled variables! Surface area to volume ratio (SA:V ratio)! Temperature of the solution! Time allowed for osmosis to occur! ! Hypothesis! I predict that there will be a negative correlation between the concentration of sugar solution and the change in mass of the potato after the experiment is over. This is because osmosis happens across a semi-permeable membrane from an area of low solute concentration to high solute…show more content…
On the other hand when the concentration of sugar in water is increased to 1 mol, the percentage change in mass is -16.87%. This shows that there is a decrease in percentage change in mass of the potato between 0.7 mol to 1.0 mol of sugar concentration in water which supports my hypothesis of a negative correlation between the two. The line of best fit supports my hypothesis as well since it shows the negative correlation between sugar concentration in water and percentage change in mass.This also makes scientific sense because osmosis occurs from moving water from a lower solute to a high solute, thus when the sugar concentration is higher, water will move from the potato into the solute and decrease the mass of the…show more content…
! Evaluation! ! Experimental error! Error How it affected the lab Improvements Error in measuring the mass of potato cylinders It affected the lab because the potato cylinders had water coming off which could have led to excess water on the electronic scale and thus change the mass of the potato cylinders across all the data This could be improved by waiting an hour before recording the mass so that all the potato cylinders are dry Exposure to A/C and sunlight was different between the sets It affected the lab because this means that the air-conditioning or sunlight may affect the temperature of the solution and change the rate of osmosis and thus increase or decreasing the mass of the potato after saturation. This could be improved by ensuring that positioning is far, that there is no A/C and that they are facing the same direction The lengths and width weren’t the same for the potato cylinders This affected the lab because it affect the surface area and volume ratios and may make it smaller which would mean rate of osmosis would be faster thus changing the mass of the potato after saturation This could be solved by using a laser to cut all of them into the same size.

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