Water Molecules Flashcards
Water is a metabolite …
This means it’s involved in metabolic reactions such as hydrolysis and condensation
water is a solvent…
This allows for metabolic reactions like hydrolysis and condensation as well as the transportation of substances due to its polarity
Water has a high specific heat capacity…
Which means it buffers the temperature changes, allowing animals to maintain a core body temperature as it can absorb lots of energy before the temperature changes.
Water has a large latent heat of vaporisation…
means that lots of the energy require to break the bonds to change states once it evaporates the energy required is carried away to providing a ‘cooling effect’
Cohesion between water molecules…
supports the formation of continuous columns of water needed to move water up the xylem also produces surface tension to support small organisms on the water surface. This is when the water meets air, hydrogen bonds occur between the top layer of water and air and create a film.
Charge of water
No overall charge, but slightly negative on oxygen as oxygen is a bigger molecule so pulls electrons towards its nucleus. Electrons are also pulled away from hydrogen and closer to oxygen removing it’s negative charge and becoming positive
What’s a dipole?
One end of a molecule is positive and the other is negative
Opposite attraction within water?
Positive pole of 1 water molecule will be attracted to the negative pole of another water molecule
Attractive force between 2 oppositely charged pole is called…
A hydrogen bond
Hydrogen bonds are…
Weak on their own but very strong when there is lots of them, this cohesive property of water gives many of its unusual properties
