Why do green mangoes lose water and shrink when pickled in brine solution?

Answer 1

Osmolarity. The salt in the brine is hyper tonic, and pulls all of the fluid from the mango, causing it to shrivel. If you put the mango in a hypotonic solution, one with less salt of the mango-
the salt in the mango would pull the water and you end up with a bloated mango.

Answer 2

Green mangoes or any system with cells lose water and shrink when picked in brine solution because of a process called osmosis.

The concentration of salt outside the mango, i.e. in the surrounding solution, is greater than the concentration inside the mango cells. This causes the water to flow out of the mango and into the concentrated brine solution to create an equilibrium; which is motivated by a difference in osmotic pressure. (Osmotic pressure is the pressure exerted by solvent particles on a semi permeable membrane, i.e. the cell's casing.)

This is why green mangoes, pickles, carrots, and even blood cells shrivel in brine solution.

FYI, if the reverse were placed, and the cells or mangoes were placed in a hypotonic solution (less concentrated) the water would flow into teh cells, and the mangoes or whatever would become BLOATED. In humans, this causes blood cells to burst.

Answer 3

A brine solution is a mixture of pure water and salts. When two bodies of water are in contact (separated by a pourous film?) and one is pure water while the other is brine, salt and water may pass in both directions through the film unless the film bars passage of salt due to pore size or perhaps charge. However, the water passes more freely than the salt and tends to dilute the brine especially at the film. The human kidney passes salt into urine then biological pumps capture and return it to the blood to help maintain the correct level of salt in the electrolytes. Human blood resembles the salty waters of the sea.