How does osmosis relate to capillary action?

Question

More specifically, how does it relate to water moving upwards in a tube? [Which means it would be awesome if you explained how osmosis relates to cohesion & adhesion also!]

i'll best answer this tomorrow, please help!

Answer 1

Capillary action is the result of adhesion and surface tension. Surface tension, in turn, is caused by cohesion.

Cohesion is force of attraction between molecules of the liquid. The molecules at the surface do not have other like molecules on all sides of them. This makes them cohere more strongly to those directly associated with them on the surface.

This forms a surface "film". It is difficult to move an object through this film or to "cut" or "break"  this film.  There is a kind of upward pushing force caused by the surface molecules sticking together. This phenomenon is called surface tension. Once this film is broken, the object can move freely in the liquid.

Adhesion is the tendency of the liquid to cling to a surface. When placed in a capillary, the molecules along the walls of the tube cling to the wall. This causes an upward force along the walls of the tube. This upward movement of the molecules along the water plus the surface tension which keeps the molecules at the surface as close together as possible, causes the surface of the liquid to take the shape of a round bottomed vessel.

This is called capillary action.

Osmosis is not related to this, I think. It is more about moving through a permeable membrane and deals with gradients of different concentrations.