It's essential that medical personnel give the proper intravenous solutions to patients. If a given solution has too much or too little solute concentration in an IV, red blood cells could become abnormal and cause issues with patients. St. Joseph High School students in Ms. Abigail Barker's anatomy class recently conducted an experiment that demonstrated how high and low solute concentrations can affect red blood cells.
"An egg was used to represent a red blood cell," Ms. Barker said. "The movement of molecules in and out of a cell is known as osmosis." Three types of solutions were tested with the eggs. Vinegar was used to represent a solute of high concentration known as a hypotonic solution. Corn syrup stood in for a hypertonic solution with a low solute concentration while water had the perfect amount of concentration called an isotonic solution.
The vinegar caused the egg to get bigger and squishy. If this had happened to a red blood cell it would have eventually bursted. The corn syrup had the opposite effect. As a hypertonic solution the egg became much smaller. A patient with swelling of the extremities would be given such a solution to draw water out of the blood to eliminate swelling. The students saw that no change occurred with the egg in the water. When an isotonic solution like this is infused into the bloodstream, red blood cells remain the same size and shape.
"The students got to witness the process of osmosis and had fun doing it," Ms. Barker said. "When the experiment was over, they were able to keep their shell-less water-filled eggs or pop them to see what happened."
In the photo, Ms. Barker shows two eggs that used food coloring in place of vinegar to create a hypotonic solution. The eggs are now shell-free and have a soft and rubbery texture perfect for Easter.