physics

The membrane that surrounds a certain type of living cell has a surface area of 4.50 × 10-9 m2 and a thickness of 1.00 × 10-8 m. Assume that the membrane behaves like a parallel plate capacitor and has a dielectric constant of 5.3. The potential on the outer surface of the membrane is +62.0 mV greater than that on the inside surface. If the charge is due to positive ions (charge +e), how many such ions are present on the outer surface?

asked by jared

  1. q = kappa epsilon A V/d
    q = 5.3* 8.8e-12 * 4.5e-9 *62e-3 / 1e-8

    Once you have this number the charge of a single ion (1.67e-19) to find out how many charges you need.

    posted by Chanz

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