Plants need to absorb mineral salts from the soil or other sources, but these salts exist in very dilute solution. Active transport enables these cells to take up salts from this dilute solution against the direction of the concentration gradient. For example, chloride (Cl−) and nitrate (NO3−) ions exist in the cytosol of plant cells, and need to be transported into the vacuole. While the vacuole has channels for these ions, transportation of them is against the concentration gradient, and thus movement of these ions is driven by hydrogen pumps, or proton pumps.