What will happen if an animal cell is placed in a beaker of distilled water?

Answer 1

It bursts.

Why?

First of all, osmosis: the diffusion of water across a selectively permeable membrane from an area of higher waterconcentration to lower water concentration. (OR low solute concentration to high solute concentration.)

Distilled water is referred to as a hypotonic solution (You should double check that) and when water enters the cell, it begins to swell and eventually bursts.

Thing is, with plant cells-they have cell walls. So with turgor pressure and the such the plant becomes turgid, but with animal cells, the cell membrane is really thin. So because there is such low water concentration in the animal cell, water rushes in, trying to balance everything out. But the cell membrane is very thin, and well, it bursts because it can only take so much.

This happens with distilled water because there is no concentration in the water at all, and there is so much water concentration compared to the inside of the animal cell.

Hope it helps:)

Answer 2

most likely, it will lyse (burst) due to the flow of water into the cell in the attempt to even out the chemical concentrations in both solutions.

Answer 3

I'm pretty sure the cell dilates and may explode after a while because it's taking water in?

Answer 4

The animal cells would burst