One Comments to “Why does rock salt kill grass, specifically by preventing the process of osmosis?”

1. ecolink says:

   November 6, 2005 at 2:38 pm

   It doesn’t prevent osmosis. Osmosis is passive transport. Water goes from higher concentration to lower concentration, whether that direction is into or out of a cell.

   Rock salt makes the surroundings hypertonic to the cell. The surroundings have a higher concentration of solute and a lower concentration of water than the inside of the cell. Therefore more water diffuses out of the cell than the amount of water that diffuses into the cell. The inside of the cell shrinks. If the situation isn’t changed quickly, the cells die.