Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Tonicity

Tonicity is a measure of blood capacity or effective osmolality in cell biology. Osmolality and osmolarity are properties of a particular solution, independent of any membrane. Tonicity is the base measurment for complex compounds with provides immunity to the body, and is equal to the sum of the concentrations of the solutes which have the capacity to exert an osmotic force across that membrane. Tonicity, also, depends on solute permemability (permeant solutes do not affect tonicity; impermeant solutes do affect tonicity). Tonicity is generally classified in three ranges; hypertonicity, hypotonicity and isotonicity. Hypertonic, isotonic and hypotonic solutions are defined in reference to a cell membrane by comparing the tonicity of the solution with the tonicity within the cell

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