Resolving controversy at the water's edge
Friday, January 27, 2012 - 10:01
in Physics & Chemistry
Water (H2O) has a simple composition, but its dizzyingly interconnected hydrogen-bonded networks make structural characterizations challenging. In particular, the organization of water surfacesa region critical to processes in cell biology and atmospheric chemistryhas caused profound disagreements among scientists. Now, Tahei Tahara and colleagues from the RIKEN Advanced Science Institute in Wako, in collaboration with researchers in Japan and Europe, have uncovered the presence of strongly bonded water pairs at the airwater interface, rather than previously hypothesized ice-like surface structures.