Exosmosis of electrolytes in arbitrary units 
206 
Walter Stiles 
trations of alcohol which bring about rapid exosmosis of water also 
bring about rapid exosmosis of electrolytes. It could be argued that 
the loss of water results from the loss of electrolytes and the con¬ 
sequent lowering of the osmotic pressure of the cell; in the present 
state of our knowledge it is safest to regard both as part of the 
phenomena of disintegration of the organisation of the cell character¬ 
ising death. 
Fig. 16. Exosmosis of electrolytes from potato immersed in solutions of ethyl 
alcohol of various concentrations (8 M to 0-75M) and in distilled water 
(D. W.). (After Stiles and Jorgensen.) 
It was shown by Stiles and Jprgensen (1917 a) that the relation 
between the quantity of exosmosis and the time of action of a toxic 
substance can be expressed approximately by the equation 
- B log (1 - ks) = D (j e + t - U), 
where s is the concentration of the electrolytes that have exuded into 
the external solution after any time t and A, B, D and k are constants, 
this equation being that obtained when it is assumed that the rate 
of exosmosis at any time is proportional to the quantity of a substance 
in the cell which is decomposed by the toxic substance. The value 
of the constant A depends partly on the concentration of the toxic 
substance in the external solution; from the exosmosis-time curves 
obtained with different substances it is clear that whatever the 
relation between A and concentration may be it is not a linear one. 
