Osmosis is the diffusion of water across a membrane from an area of higher water concentration (lower solute concentration) to lower water concentration (higher solute concentration).

If the environment is hypertonic, the water concentration is greater inside the cell while the solute concentration is higher outside; the interior of the cell is hypotonic to the surrounding hypertonic environment. The net flow of water is out of the cell.

Flash Animation Illustrating Osmosis in a Hypertonic Environment by Gary E. Kaiser, Ph.D.
Professor of Microbiology, The Community College of Baltimore County, Catonsville Campus
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at http://faculty.ccbcmd.edu/~gkaiser/index.html.

Last updated: Feb., 2018
Please send comments and inquiries to Dr. Gary Kaiser