Question

What are the important properties of water?Define polarity.

Answer 1

@Calebwhitekj

Answer 2

Important Properties of water: It is highly polar. It can act as an acid or a base, depending on the situation. It is sometimes considered "the universal solvent".

Define Polarity: The property of having poles or being polar.

Answer 3

Water molecules have cohesion with eachother this sticks them together when they are travelling up the xylem and also adhesion to the walls of the xylem vessels to minimise the downward effects of gravity. This is important because these properties facilitate the movement of water up to the top of very tall trees through the capilliary effect in the xylem vessels when water evaporates from the leaves and more water moves up to take its place. The xylem work like long thin straws in the stems of plants.

Answer 4

Water molecules have a high specific heat capacity (~4.1855kJ/kg K) - i.e. it takes a large amount of energy to raise the temperature of a unit mass of water by 1 deg C. This makes it an important temperature buffer for metabolic reactions occurring in vivo as well as for marine organisms to survive in conditions of extreme cold. Also, water makes a good coolant in this respect, since minimal loss of water is coupled to maximum loss of heat energy through evaporation of sweat (in animals), or evapotranspiration (in plants).