Osmosis and Osmotic Pressure of the Solution

(1) Osmosis: The flow of solvent from pure solvent or from solution of lower concentration into solution of higher concentration through a semi-permeable membrane is called Osmosis.Osmosis may be divided in following types,

(i) Exo-Osmosis: The outward osmotic flow of water from a cell containing an aqueous solution through a semi-permeable membrane is called as Exo-osmosis. For example, egg (after removing hard shell) placed in conc. NaCl solutions, will shrink due to exo-osmosis.

(ii) Endo-osmosis: The inward flow of water into the cell containing an aqueous solution through a semi-permeable membrane is called as endo-osmosis. e.g., an egg placed in water swells up due to endo-osmosis.

(iii) Reverse osmosis: If a pressure higher than osmotic pressure is applied on the solution, the solvent will flow from the solution into the pure solvent through the semi-permeable membrane. Since here the flow of solvent is in the reverse direction to that observed in the usual osmosis, the process is called reverse osmosis.