Using the Advanced Photon Source, scientists have recreated the structure of ice formed at the center of planets like Neptune and Uranus.
Using the Advanced Photon Source, scientists have recreated the structure of ice formed at the center of planets like Neptune and Uranus.
Everyone knows about ice, liquid and vapor — but, depending on the conditions, water can actually form more than a dozen different structures. Scientists have now added a new phase to the list: superionic ice.
This type of ice forms at extremely high temperatures and pressures, such as those deep inside planets like Neptune and Uranus. Previously superionic ice had only been glimpsed in a brief instant as scientists sent a shockwave through a droplet of water, but in a new study published in Nature Physics, scientists found a way to reliably create, sustain and examine the ice.
“It was a surprise — everyone thought this phase wouldn’t appear until you are at much higher pressures than where we first find it,” said study co-author Vitali Prakapenka, a University of Chicago research professor and beamline scientist at the Advanced Photon Source (APS), a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science user facility at the DOE’s Argonne National Laboratory. “But we were able to very accurately map the properties of this new ice, which constitutes a new phase of matter, thanks to several powerful tools.”
Read more at DOE/Argonne National Laboratory
Photo Credit: TheSpaceway via Pixabay
