A Bizarre Form of Water May Exist All Over the Universe (wired.com) 63
New submitter jimminy_cricket writes: Recently at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics in Brighton, New York, one of the world's most powerful lasers blasted a droplet of water, creating a shock wave that raised the water's pressure to millions of atmospheres and its temperature to thousands of degrees. X-rays that beamed through the droplet in the same fraction of a second offered humanity's first glimpse of water under those extreme conditions. The x-rays revealed that the water inside the shock wave didn't become a superheated liquid or gas. Paradoxically -- but just as physicists squinting at screens in an adjacent room had expected -- the atoms froze solid, forming crystalline ice.
"You hear the shot," said Marius Millot of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, and "right away you see that something interesting was happening." Millot co-led the experiment with Federica Coppari, also of Lawrence Livermore. The findings, published this week in Nature, confirm the existence of "superionic ice," a new phase of water with bizarre properties. Unlike the familiar ice found in your freezer or at the north pole, superionic ice is black and hot. A cube of it would weigh four times as much as a normal one. It was first theoretically predicted more than 30 years ago, and although it has never been seen until now, scientists think it might be among the most abundant forms of water in the universe.
"You hear the shot," said Marius Millot of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, and "right away you see that something interesting was happening." Millot co-led the experiment with Federica Coppari, also of Lawrence Livermore. The findings, published this week in Nature, confirm the existence of "superionic ice," a new phase of water with bizarre properties. Unlike the familiar ice found in your freezer or at the north pole, superionic ice is black and hot. A cube of it would weigh four times as much as a normal one. It was first theoretically predicted more than 30 years ago, and although it has never been seen until now, scientists think it might be among the most abundant forms of water in the universe.
But... (Score:4, Insightful)
Does it melt? (and if yes, when and how? by cooling?)
Molecules or Atoms or??? (Score:2)
When I RFTA, it says that the oxygen atoms are at the corners and faces of the resulting lattice.
Wouldn't it make more sense for the oxygen atoms to to simply leave rather than combine with the hydrogen atoms (single protons) which are wandering about the lattice helping to conduct electricity?
Re: (Score:2)
Wouldn't it make more sense for the oxygen atoms to to simply leave rather than combine with the hydrogen atoms ...
It might make more sense; let's talk to the Oxygen atom about this ... :-)
[What (seemingly) makes sense and reality don't always align.]
Re: (Score:2)
The oxygen atoms can't "leave" since they are constrained by their surroundings (the high pressure), so much so that they're not even a liquid but lockied into a face-centered cubic [wikipedia.org] crystalline lattice. The hydrogen atoms are free to flow -- don't ask me how-- but remember that this is water so you still have H+
Re: (Score:2)
Yes. All energy except heat can be converted to another form.
In this case, we're probably talking about a space cannon. Not first class.
Re:But... (Score:5, Interesting)
Numerical simulations suggest that the characteristic diffusion of the protons through the empty sites of the oxygen solid lattice (1) gives rise to a surprisingly high ionic conductivity above 100 Siemens per centimetre, that is, almost as high as typical metallic (electronic) conductivity, (2) greatly increases the ice melting temperature to several thousand kelvin, and (3) favours new ice structures with a close-packed oxygen lattice.
Apparently only very reluctantly if I'm reading this right.
Re:But... (Score:5, Interesting)
It melts at fairly high temperatures (2-3,000 Kelvin) but it only exists in the first place at very high pressures (100GPa+). It wouldn't be stable on your countertop. There's actually lots of different forms of water ice depending on temperature and pressure (this is tentatively Ice XVIII, because there are 17 other already known forms of water ice). This stuff might be interesting in certain ways (like having high electric conductivity and maybe being very common), but the fact a new form of water ice exists is in and of itself not all that interesting.
Re:But... (Score:5, Informative)
For a description of the various forms of ice...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
Does it melt? (and if yes, when and how? by cooling?)
I can't find a phase diagram showing Ice XVIII (another name for this phase), but it is likely surrounded by other ice phases. At STP it would certainly melt (or more likely explode, as it exists at quite high temperature and pressure).
Re: (Score:3)
Water's phases are weird, to say the least.
Re: (Score:2)
You have no earthly idea what you're blathering about. The phases don't work like that.
There is only one Earthly phase of water ice.
Subject (Score:2)
Let me guess . . . "dark water"?
Seems like every time they don't understand something the answer is always "Dark ".
FTFA: It's "Black and Hot" (Score:2)
Insert jokes about how Superionic water is just like how you like your coffee ... or women.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Insert jokes about how Superionic water is just like how you like your coffee ... or women.
We're here to make water metal. We will make everything metal. Blacker than the blackest black times infinity.
Re: (Score:3)
Let me guess . . . "dark water"?
Better watch out for the pirates.
Re: (Score:2)
Let me guess . . . "dark water"?
It's worse than that, Jim . . . it's Ice-Nine!
Felix Hoenikker is the "Father of the Atom Bomb." Felix Hoenikker was proclaimed one of the smartest scientists on Earth. An eccentric and emotionless man, he is depicted as amoral and apathetic towards anything other than his research. He needed only something to keep him busy, such as in his role as one of the "Fathers of the Atomic Bomb", and in his creation of "ice-nine," a potentially catastrophic substance with the capability to destroy all life on Earth, but which he saw merely as a mental puzzle (a Marine general suggested developing a substance that could solidify mud so soldiers could run across it more easily). During experiments with "ice nine", Felix takes a nap in his rocking chair and dies. It is the narrator's quest for biographical details about Hoenikker that provides both the background and the connecting thread between the various subsections of the story.
Holy Ice-Nine, Batman! Do you have an Ice-Nine defroster on your Batbelt?!?
Re: (Score:2)
Let me guess . . . "dark water"?
Probably not, since it apparently glows yellow.
Re: (Score:2)
"Seems like every time they don't understand something the answer is always "Dark "."
Dark matter, dark energy, ? That's some induction process you have going there.
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I always wondered why the heat of fusion of ICE-9 didn't cook everything.
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just keep it out of my scotch, mkay?
RTFA - the stuff is hot. Put it in my coffee!
As foretold in Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle (Score:2)
Ice Nine (Score:1)
The end is near.
Re: (Score:2)
This is Ice 18 (well, Ice XVIII). There were already 17 types of ice from water.
Oh, that stuff (Score:5, Funny)
We have the same thing here in Flint, Michigan.
Re: (Score:2)
Water is strange (Score:1)