Even if it is a glass tabletop, I don't think this is possible with the way fluids work. I think the tabletop is chilled, so any liquid becomes semi-frozen, at least at the bottom, so the plastic edge can easily slide underneath and pick it up without cutting into the ice crystals on the tabletop. Which is probably why the metal blade they showed didn't work; it cut into the ice and just pushed the stuff around.

Edit: However, watching this video of the same technology (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJ0PqzX8Ey0) just confused me more. Like someone said above, it looks like a rapid conveyor belt action instead of a blade.

>> ^COriolanus:

what was the air pressure?


I'm guessing this took place at a relatively normal air pressure. If it were a vacuum then they would need to cool the water below ~0C to keep it from boiling (depending on purity).

Now I want to see what happens when the nanotubes are cold enough to form ice crystals within the droplets.

>> ^xxovercastxx:
>> ^ghark:
So the sonic boom caused ice crystals to form in circular patterns causing the sun dog?

The ice crystals and sundog were already there as visible by the prismatic effect that becomes visible on the right at 1:51. The sonic boom created the ripples through those crystal clouds.


ahh, thanks

>> ^ghark:
So the sonic boom caused ice crystals to form in circular patterns causing the sun dog?


The ice crystals and sundog were already there as visible by the prismatic effect that becomes visible on the right at 1:51. The sonic boom created the ripples through those crystal clouds.

So the sonic boom caused ice crystals to form in circular patterns causing the sun dog?

Could this be the Science Museum in London? They have very similar peice of equipment in the kids section there. I last went there with an American visiting the UK, and we spent far too long in that kids area messing around with the toys. There was a thermal vision camera in that area and near that there was a piece that showed how ice crystals formed. So we pressed our hands onto the ice, painted pictures onto our faces and ran over to the thermal vision camera. We had all these poor kids double taking as we walked by with these blue stripes all over our faces.

So in summary, the kids section of the science museum is awesome, don't skip it

>> ^gtjwkq:
I'm a bit confused about some things you said. You're using the concept of entropy to define the concept of time. Doesn't entropy require time to be defined? Because that would be problematic.

I don't really understand this topic myself, but here goes:

Loosely speaking, entropy is defined as how ordered a system is. So, water in the form of ice crystals is much more ordered and has lower entropy than water vapor. So you don't need time to define entropy.

The fascinating thing is that on a microscopic scale, processes are symmetric in time, meaning that hypothetically, if you filmed a microscopic event and then played it backwards, both versions of events would be valid. You would not be able to tell which way time is supposed to flow. Entropy however, is the only (?) property of the universe that is NOT time symmetric. On a macroscopic scale, the second law of thermodynamics states that entropy of an isolated system will increase over time. Or you can rephrase the second law as: time flows forward in the direction of increasing entropy.

Check out this wiki page for a better explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_of_time

I've been abusing my own camera too.

http://piclab.blogspot.com/

In reply to this comment by NordlichReiter:
I remember that site you showed me a long while ago. Toss your camera...

Gave me this idea.

http://schwarzerhund.deviantart.com/art/Motion-Blur-Lights-108656593

Took this one Xmas, some of those ice crystal lights.

i hope i'm not wrong, otherwise i'll get run over by the sift bus, but i'm pretty sure the explanation is incorrect. i do this with my Smart Water daily at work, and as far as i know, there's no CO2 in my water, releasing pressure.

the real reason this happens is nucleation. though i don't get why the initial rise of CO2 when the bottle is opened does not provide that nucleation. with water, all that is required is a bubble, and the supercooled water will start to form ice crystals on that seed. in the beer's case, this was the sudden formation of CO2 bubbles at the bottom due to the violation of Man-Law (beer tapping). this formed a seed where nucleation occurs. leaving the bottle closed, and simply giving it a quick shake (as i do with my water) should provide the same results.


( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercooling )
water example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuPfsAdEG2E

this may be a little off the subject of what you are talking about, but I am curious. I think I understand the freezing process well enough. What I don't understand is, once cells(let's say just simple single-celled organisms) are frozen without damage, no ice crystals etc., what makes the unfreezing process dangerous?

Well this idiot thinks that sounds like a diesel in the background and I don't know of many airplanes with such an engine. The sound of dirt underfoot would seem to negate it being on a boat. They are filming through a light enhancing scope or other device, which would be particularly sensitive to the above mentioned atmospheric phenomina of high altitude ice crystals, Mr. Dirt.

In reply to this comment by joedirt:
idiots. This is shot out of an airplane window, correct? It is probably the effects of the plexiglass or whatever and/or the micro-scratches. Just like when you look through glasses or a car windshield you can see effects like this.

Well this idiot thinks that sounds like a diesel in the background and I don't know of many airplanes with such an engine. The sound of dirt underfoot would seem to negate it being on a boat. They are filming through a light enhancing scope or other device, which would be particularly sensitive to the above mentioned atmospheric phenomina of high altitude ice crystals, Mr. Dirt.

High altitude ice crystals, most likely...

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap060305.html

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Doc_M, the battle against membrane rupture from ice crystals seems to be big one.

IANAC but I think what they do is, pump the body full of propylene glycol which vitrifies the cells on freezing, prevents crystals and stops membrane rupture. The problem with that though is that propylene glycol is very toxic in its own right and will have to be removed safely at the time of thawing.

I'll admit, it's a super-longshot. But- I'll take million to one odds over nothing.

A kind of modified Pascal's Wager works pretty well for this.

You can reproduce something like this if you put a vodka cooler in the freezer until very cold( I tried with Rev, a kind of energy drink with 7% vodka), it stays liquid due to the alcohol, but if you pour it over an ice cube it instantly turns to slush.
I believe that the crystalline formation in the ice cube forces the water to line-up and form ice crystals.
Anyway, it's a neat party trick.