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First teaching 2023

First exams 2025

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Water Potential (HL IB Biology)

Exam Questions

58 mins13 questions

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Water Potential

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Water Potential

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11 mark

A student places an animal cell and a plant cell into distilled water and notes the following observations.

       Animal cell: swells and then bursts.

      Plant cell: swells.

What is the reason for this difference?

  • Plant cell surface membranes are partially permeable

  • Animal cells have no vacuole

  • Animal cells have no cell wall

  • Plant cell walls are freely permeable

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21 mark

What will happen to a plant cell placed in a hypotonic solution?

  • It will burst

  • It will swell with water and become turgid

  • Nothing will happen

  • It will shrink and shrivel and become flaccid

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31 mark

Which of the following is the correct equation used to calculate water potential? 

  • Ψw = Ψs + Ψp

  • Ψw = Ψs - Ψp

  • Ψw = Ψp - Ψs

  • Ψw = Ψs ÷ Ψp

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11 mark

The diagram below shows red blood cells that have been bathed in solutions of different solute concentration.

q2-1-3-cell-membrane-medium-ib-hl-biology

Which row of the table correctly describes the three solutions that these red blood cells have been bathed in?

  I II III
A. Isotonic Hypotonic Isotonic
B. Isotonic Hypertonic Hypotonic
C. Isotonic Hypotonic Hypertonic
D. Hypertonic Hypotonic Isotonic

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    2
    Sme Calculator    1 mark

    The graph below shows the outcome of an experiment investigating the change in mass of potato chips placed in sucrose solutions of different concentrations. 

    investigating-osmosis-in-potato-results

    Which of the following statements about the graph is not correct? 

    • The point where the line crosses the X axis is called the isotonic solute concentration. 

    • There is not a significant difference between the change in mass values at every solute concentration.

    • The least osmosis took place when the sucrose solution was 1.0 mol dm3.

    • The bigger the error bars, the lower the confidence in the reliability of the data. 

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    3
    Sme Calculator    1 mark

    When investigating osmosis in plant tissue any changes to mass and length are recorded over a period of time.

    What are the most appropriate units of measurement for mass and length during this investigation?

    • kg and cm

    • g and cm

    • g and mm

    • kg and mm

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    1
    Sme Calculator    1 mark

    An experiment to calculate the water potential of potato cells was performed using the following protocol:

    1. Dice potato into 1cm3 cubes.
    2. Add potato cubes to 6 test tubes, each containing solution with a different sucrose concentration.
    3. Wait 12 hours.
    4. Weigh the cubes from each test tube and plot a graph. 

    The mean mass of the potato cubes was 2.50 g before being added to the solution, and the graph shows the masses of the potato cubes after the experiment. 1-3-h-q4-paper-1

    Which concentration of sucrose matches the water potential of the potato cells?

    • 0.00 mol dm-3

    • 0.12 mol dm-3

    • 0.31 mol dm-3

    • 0.66 mol dm-3

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