Meaning & use
plasma membrane
The thin, selectively permeable layer of lipids and proteins that surrounds a cell and controls what enters or leaves it.
See it in a sentence
Water molecules pass through the plasma membrane by a process called osmosis.
The plasma membrane keeps the cell's internal environment stable despite changes outside it.
A note on using this word
Also simply called the 'cell membrane'; 'plasma' here refers to the cell's contents, not blood plasma.
Words with a similar meaning
cell membrane
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