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Related Concept Videos

Diffusion01:21

Diffusion

Diffusion is a type of passive transport. In passive transport, a substance tends to move from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration until the concentration is equal across the space. For example, take the diffusion of substances through the air. When someone opens a perfume bottle in a room filled with people, the perfume is at its highest concentration in the bottle and is at its lowest at the edges of the room. The perfume vapor will diffuse, or spread away, from the...
Diffusion01:12

Diffusion

Diffusion is the passive movement of substances down their concentration gradients—requiring no expenditure of cellular energy. Substances, such as molecules or ions, diffuse from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration in the cytosol or across membranes. Eventually, the concentration will even out, with the substance moving randomly but causing no net change in concentration. Such a state is called dynamic equilibrium, which is essential for maintaining overall...
Passive Diffusion: Overview and Kinetics01:17

Passive Diffusion: Overview and Kinetics

Passive diffusion is a critical process that allows small lipophilic drugs to cross the cell membrane along a concentration gradient. This mechanism's efficiency depends on four primary factors: the membrane's surface area, the drug's lipid-water partition coefficient, the concentration gradient, and the membrane's thickness.
When administered orally, drugs establish a substantial concentration gradient between the gastrointestinal (GI) lumen and the bloodstream, expediting their diffusion into...
Protein Diffusion in the Membrane01:24

Protein Diffusion in the Membrane

Proteins show rotational as well as lateral diffusion across the membrane. The lateral diffusion of proteins was confirmed through the cell fusion experiment where mouse and human cells were fused, resulting in hybrid cells. When the human and mouse cells fused, the specific membrane proteins on human and mouse cells were marked with the red and green-fluorescent markers, respectively. Initially, the red and green fluorescence was located on the respective hemisphere of the cell. As time...
Behavior of Gas Molecules: Molecular Diffusion, Mean Free Path, and Effusion03:48

Behavior of Gas Molecules: Molecular Diffusion, Mean Free Path, and Effusion

Although gaseous molecules travel at tremendous speeds (hundreds of meters per second), they collide with other gaseous molecules and travel in many different directions before reaching the desired target. At room temperature, a gaseous molecule will experience billions of collisions per second. The mean free path is the average distance a molecule travels between collisions. The mean free path increases with decreasing pressure; in general, the mean free path for a gaseous molecule will be...
Osmosis01:30

Osmosis

Osmosis is the movement of free water molecules through a semipermeable membrane.  The water's concentration gradient across the membrane is inversely proportional to the solutes' concentration. Whereas diffusion transports material across membranes and within cells, osmosis transports only water across a membrane, and the membrane limits the diffusion of solutes in the water. Osmosis is a special case of diffusion.
Water, like other substances, moves from a high concentration of free water...

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 25, 2026

In Situ Monitoring of Diffusion of Guest Molecules in Porous Media Using Electron Paramagnetic Resonance Imaging
06:34

In Situ Monitoring of Diffusion of Guest Molecules in Porous Media Using Electron Paramagnetic Resonance Imaging

Published on: September 2, 2016

Diffusion in porous crystalline materials.

Rajamani Krishna1

  • 1Van 't Hoff Institute for Molecular Sciences, University of Amsterdam, Science Park 904, 1098 XH Amsterdam, The Netherlands. r.krishna@uva.nl

Chemical Society Reviews
|January 21, 2012
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Understanding diffusion in porous materials is key for separation and catalysis. This review unifies descriptions of diffusion in meso- and micro-pores, highlighting molecular interactions and their impact on process technologies.

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The Diffusion of Passive Tracers in Laminar Shear Flow
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A Method for Determination and Simulation of Permeability and Diffusion in a 3D Tissue Model in a Membrane Insert System for Multi-well Plates

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Last Updated: May 25, 2026

In Situ Monitoring of Diffusion of Guest Molecules in Porous Media Using Electron Paramagnetic Resonance Imaging
06:34

In Situ Monitoring of Diffusion of Guest Molecules in Porous Media Using Electron Paramagnetic Resonance Imaging

Published on: September 2, 2016

The Diffusion of Passive Tracers in Laminar Shear Flow
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The Diffusion of Passive Tracers in Laminar Shear Flow

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A Method for Determination and Simulation of Permeability and Diffusion in a 3D Tissue Model in a Membrane Insert System for Multi-well Plates
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A Method for Determination and Simulation of Permeability and Diffusion in a 3D Tissue Model in a Membrane Insert System for Multi-well Plates

Published on: February 23, 2018

Area of Science:

  • Materials Science
  • Chemical Engineering
  • Physical Chemistry

Background:

  • Accurate modeling of guest molecule diffusion in porous crystalline materials is crucial for designing separation and catalytic processes.
  • Meso- and micro-porous structures exhibit distinct diffusion behaviors due to pore size and molecule-wall interactions.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To provide a unified, phenomenological description of diffusion in meso- and micro-porous materials.
  • To explain the characteristics and physical significance of various diffusivities (self, Maxwell-Stefan, Fick).

Main Methods:

  • Review of experimental data and molecular dynamics simulations.
  • Analysis of diffusion in diverse porous structures with varying pore sizes and topologies.
  • Phenomenological description of diffusion phenomena.

Main Results:

  • Meso-pore diffusion (2 nm < d(p) < 50 nm) is influenced by molecule-molecule and molecule-wall interactions.
  • Micro-pore diffusion (d(p) < 2 nm) is dominated by molecule-wall interactions, involving adsorbed molecule motion.
  • Adsorption thermodynamics, molecular clustering, and segregation significantly affect diffusivity magnitudes and concentration dependencies.

Conclusions:

  • Correlations in molecular hops slow down more mobile species in mixture diffusion.
  • The Maxwell-Stefan formulation is essential for accurately modeling correlation effects in diffusion.
  • Proper modeling is vital for optimizing membrane separations and catalytic reactors.