eli5: if particles want to move from high concentrations to low, how does reverse osmosis happen?
In: 2
Most of the time when you hear the phrase “reverse osmosis” it is just a slightly fancy way of saying “filter.”
You apply pressure to one side of a porous screen where the holes are big enough to allow water to seep through but not the particulates and the particles are left on one side as the water is pushed through to the other.
It’s “reverse” osmosis because if the pressure was not there then water from the clean side would tend to flow across the barrier to dilute the impure side in order to try to achieve equilibrium. That’s regular osmosis. So if you put pressure in to force the water back through the barrier it’s reversing the process.
Which sounds a lot more scientific than saying “we poured it through a cheap filter.”
Latest Answers