The role of water in the cage. Free and bound form

Water is the source of life on our planet. Her role is so great that you can not enumerate everything. Imagine what would be our life without the very H2O molecule? It's simple, it would be completely absent, because a person is ninety percent water. Even when examining other planets, scientists are primarily looking for water, and in any of its aggregate state. Because life originated in it.

Today's work we decided to devote to such a topic as the role of water in the cage. What does it perform? We will try to understand all this very clearly in this article. Let's get down to work, the first question is the role and significance of water for all living organisms, and for a single cell.

Water is the source of life

The very name of this section already says a lot about the meaning of H2O. But still we'll talk about this a little more. To begin with, this is one of the most amazing substances on our planet. The land is almost completely covered with water, the land area is less than more than twice. Pure water does not exist in nature, and can not be, but it is obtained artificially. It has no smell, no color, no taste. In nature, by mass, one can single out such a pattern of water composition:

• 11.19 percent hydrogen;
• 88.81 percent of oxygen.

If we take natural water, it represents the collection of many chemical compounds based on salts. In addition to salts, there are also gases. At the moment, two-thirds of Mendeleyev's periodic table have been revealed in sea water. With the growth of technical progress, it is possible that the rest will appear.

What is the role of water in the cell? To begin with, we note that its percentage ratio can be from 40 to 98 percent. Its role, functions, we will note a little later.

Water molecules

Before we note the role of water in the cell, a little talk about the molecule itself. H2O is the most common compound of our planet. Water is contained everywhere, only in a different percentage, that is, its quantity is different. For example, let's take a tooth enamel and a developing embryo, so water takes 10 and 90 percent, respectively.

It is also important to know that in the human body it is more than 60 percent, and the content in the young body is much greater. SoE in the body of the baby is more than 70 percent of the fluid. People have long wondered why we are getting old, and not living forever. So one of the hypotheses appeared: the body grows old, since proteins can not bind a large amount of water.

Everywhere in the human body there is water:

• Bones - 20 percent;
• The brain - 80 percent;
• Liver - 80 percent;
• Muscles - 80 percent.

It is also important to know that the basis of life is the metabolism, and without water it is impossible to have protein, carbohydrate, fat, and so on. Proceeding from all told, we can already allocate a role of water in a cage, even not one. We will list them right now.

Functions

So, the water in the cell performs the following functions:

• Maintains the elasticity of the cell, for example, if cells lose fluid, then the fruits of trees and shrubs can dry out, and the leaves may wither;
• Water participates in the process of removing harmful elements and in the movement of substances;
• Water promotes the rapid flow of chemical reactions, since many substances are capable of dissolving in it;
• Dissolution of salts and sugar;
• Direct participation in the process of thermoregulation, since water can slowly heat up and cool down.

Proceeding from this, it can be argued that water in the cell is simply necessary. It participates in all vital processes occurring in the body of man and other living beings of our planet.

Free Water

It is also important to know that the water in the cage can be in two forms:

• Free;
• Related.

Now we will examine each of these species in detail. In this section, we consider the free, which approximately occupies 95 percent of the water in the cell. It is used as a solvent, but we'll talk about this in more detail a bit later. Another purpose is the environment for protoplasm. But there are also other uses of H2O in the cell - this is the removal of unnecessary substances. As we mentioned earlier, water is involved in the process of thermoregulation, it absorbs heat and does not give the temperature of the cells to make sudden jumps.

Bound Water

Now about another form, which only takes 5 percent of the water in the cage. The bound water is capable of binding to proteins via hydrogen or other bonds. It is important to know that this compound is not very strong.

It is also called immobilized, it is part of the fibrillar structure of the molecule. Let us also clarify that bound water can be connected with positively and negatively charged proteins, this is due to the fact that the distribution of charges is asymmetric, and the molecule acts as a diapole.

We mentioned that water is in the human body and its distribution is uneven, but did not say anything about the time of its full renewal. It depends on the environment and the climate to which the organism is adapted. For example:

• Amoeba - 7 days;
• Man - 28 days;
• Camel - 90 days;
• Turtle - 1 year;
• Cactus - 30 years.

Solvent

Water in the life of the cell plays a rather large role. We talked about the fact that water is a universal solvent, for this we must thank the polarity and the ability to form a hydrogen bond. So, it can dissolve both ionic compounds (salt, acid), and non-ionic (alcohol, sugar, amino acid). They are at least non-ionic, but polar, and the substances contain charged groups.