Compendium 5 Flashcards
plasma membrane
Plasma membrane is said to be a fluid mosaic model
- Means its always in a state if change, not a static structure
- It can respond to environment around It
Structure and function of membrane
- Boundary of cells – encloses and supports contents
- Separates intracellular vs. extracellular materials/ environment
- Controls what moles come into and out of the cell
- Base structure is a phospholipid bilayer with the phosphate group on the outside because they are hydrophilic, meaning they like water and the lipid tails on the inside of the membrane are hydrophobic, don’t like water
- So water liking on both sides with the phosphate and water disliking in the middle with the phospholipids
- There also a number of proteins that are present in the membrane e.g. glycoprotein
- There are membrane channels which are just protein channels that allow things to move from one side to the other very easily
- Integral membrane proteins- membrane proteins that are inserted into the membrane
- Browny yellowy strands – these are part of the inferior cytoskeleton of the cell which tends to give the cell shape and also helps organelles themselves- so the cytoskeleton is actually attached to the plasma membrane so the hole cell is in really close connection with messages going back and forward all the time
Plasma membrane — fluid mosaic model
- Attaches cells to other cells and to the surrounding matrix- cell to cell adhesion
- Cells communicate with their environment through their cell membrane
- Determines what can move into and out of the cell (selectively permeable)
Intra and extracellular environment is different - Difference in charge across membrane- membrane potential
- Structure is a fluid mosaic model
- Lipid bilayer
Phospholipids
Cholesterol - Proteins
Inserted in the lipid bilayer
Peripheral or integral
Many are involved in transporting molecules across the cell membrane, e.g. channel proteins, carrier proteins, ATP powered pumps
Transport proteins – channel proteins
- A channel protein forms a tiny channel through the plasma membrane so that molecules of a certain size, shape and charge can pass through
- There’s non-gated ion channels
Always open - Gated ion channels
Opened or closed by certain stimuli
Transport protein – Carrier protein
- Also called transporters
- Integral proteins move ions from one side of the membrane to the other
Specific binding sites
Protein changes shape to transport ions or molecules
Resumes original shape after transport
Uniporters (carries 1 molecule), symptorters (carries 2 molecules in the same direction across the membrane), antiporters (carries 2 molecules in opposite directions across the membrane)
ATP-powered transport
- Requires energy in form of ATP
- Transports substances against their concentration gradient, so the cell can accumulate substances
- E.g. sodium potassium pump
- Sometimes you need more glucose even though it’s got a lot, e.g. glucose, to do so you need to do it with energy
Diffusion and osmosis – first principles
All molecules are in a state of random motion (kinetic energy)
Solute
Dissolved substances in a solution
e.g. glucose, sucrose, ions (Na+, K+, Cl-)
Solvent
Liquid that holds solutes
Generally water
Solution
Mixture form when solute is dissolved in solvent
Diffusion
- When molecules move from an area of high concentration to an area of lower concentration
- Continues until molecules have evenly distributed themselves throughout the solution
Diffusion through cell membrane
- Firstly there are certain specific non-lipid soluble molecules or ions diffuse through membrane channels
- Other non-lipid soluble molecules, for which membrane channels are not present, cant enter the cell
- Lipid soluble molecules diffuse directly through the plasma membrane
Facilitated diffusion
- Is a specialised form of diffusion that’s important for large water soluble molecules or molecules with an electrical charge
- Larger proteins that cant just move through a simple membrane so they have to have a specific transport mechanism
- Amino acids and glucose in, manufactured proteins out
- Passive- no energy, large molecules move down concentration gradient, from high concentration to low concentration
osmosis
Is the diffusion of water across a selectively permeable membrane, e.g. the plasma membrane
A selectively permeable membrane lets water to pass through but any solutes dissolved in the water
If the beaker contains distilled water (water with no solutes), water molecules will move back and forth across the membrane at the same rate and the water level stays the same on both sides
Effect of concentration of the solution
- we can see that the concentration of the solute determines how much water moves across the membrane
- So the more concentrated a solution is, the more that solution will ‘pull’ water towards it
- A dilute or weak solution with a small number of solutes will only have a weak ‘pull’ on water
- A concentrated solution with a large number of solutes will have a strong ‘pull’ on water
osmolarity
- This ‘pull’ on water created by soliutes is termed the solution’s osmotic pressure or osmolarity
Measured in Osmoles/L or mOsmoles/L (milliolsmoles) - Generally in the body we are working with solutions which are fairly dilute so we can use the unit mOsmoles/L
- As we can see the osmolarity of a solution is directly related to the concentration of the solution – the more ions there are in the solutions the more pull it will have on water, hence higher osmolarity
- A weak solution will have a low osmolarity value
- A more concentrated solution will have a higher osmolarity value
- A solution that has an osmolarity of 100mOsmol/L will have a smaller ‘pull’ on water that a solution which has an osmolarity of 300mOsmol/L
Osmolarity and body cells
- Body fluids have many dissolved solutes
- Body fluids can be divided into
Intracellular
Extracellular (intercellular and intravascular- inside blood vessels) - The osmolarity of the intracellular fluid of a normal cell under normal conditions is approximately 290mOsmol/L
Isotonic solution
- When a cell is placed in a solution that has the same osmolarity as the inside of the cell, the solution is called isotonic
- Water will move between the intracellular and extracellular fluid at equal rates (no net movement of water) and the cell is happy