question_answer 40)

Define water potential and solute potential.        

Answer:

                Water potential is a measure of free energy associated with water per unit volume . The water potential of pure water at atmospheric pressure is zero. The unit of waterpotential is bars or Pascal (1 mPa =10 bars). Solute Potential The addition of solutes reduce water potential (to negative value). Thisreduces the concentration of water. Hence, solutions have a lower water potential than purewater, the magnitude of this lowering due to dissolution of a solute is called solute potentialor