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23 Nov 2019
The first accurate estimate of the thickness of biological cellmembranes used a capacitive technique, in which the capacitance perunit area of cell membrane was determined through a macroscopicmeasurement of the electric properties of a suspension of cells;the result was a value of about 1 micro Faraday/cm^2 for a widerange of cells.
Question:
Assuming a dielectric constant of about 3 for the membranematerial, find the membrane thickness. Note: Your answer is thethickness of the bipolar lipid layer alone, and is lower by afactor of about 3 than values based on X-ray techniques; the fullmembrane may be thicker still.
Express your answer using two significant figures.
The first accurate estimate of the thickness of biological cellmembranes used a capacitive technique, in which the capacitance perunit area of cell membrane was determined through a macroscopicmeasurement of the electric properties of a suspension of cells;the result was a value of about 1 micro Faraday/cm^2 for a widerange of cells.
Question:
Assuming a dielectric constant of about 3 for the membranematerial, find the membrane thickness. Note: Your answer is thethickness of the bipolar lipid layer alone, and is lower by afactor of about 3 than values based on X-ray techniques; the fullmembrane may be thicker still.
Express your answer using two significant figures.
Casey DurganLv2
5 Aug 2019
