Question

why higher concentrated alcohol is not tested in the experiment of the effects of alcohol on beet cells?

Answer 1

The effects of ethanol on beetroot are checked in order to determine the damage on the membrane phospholipids, affecting its integrity.

Ethanol in principle disrupts the phospholipid bilayer of the beetroot, causing the red pigment to leak out from the cells. So, the absorbance of this red colour is measured with respect to the increase in concentration of ethanol, in order to determine the effects.

ethanol (%) 2 5 10 20 40 absorbance (blue light) 0.9 0,8 0.7 0.6 0,5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 10 30 40 20 ethanol (%)

^{Image adapted from http://www.mystrica.com/Applications/membrane}

So, at higher concentration, ethanol disrupts the physical structure of phospholipid membrane, allowing the red pigment to diffuse indefinitely. So, this will not give a definite idea about the ethanol based membrane structure damage but can also result due to errors.