Bizarre fourth state of water discovered

_“You already know that water can have three states of matter: solid, liquid and gas. But scientists at the Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL) have discovered that when it’s put under extreme pressure in small spaces, the life-giving liquid can exhibit a strange fourth state known as tunneling.

The water under question was found in super-small six-sided channels in the mineral beryl, which forms the basis for the gems aquamarine and emerald. The channels measure only about five atoms across and function basically as cages that can each trap one water molecule. What the researchers found was that in this incredibly tight space, the water molecule exhibited a characteristic usually only seen at the much smaller quantum level, called tunneling.

Basically, quantum tunneling means that a particle, or in this case a molecule, can overcome a barrier and be on both sides of it at once – or anywhere between. Think of rolling a ball down one side of a hill and up another. The second hill is the barrier and the ball would only have enough energy to climb it to the height from which it was originally dropped. If the second hill was taller, the ball wouldn’t be able to roll over it. That’s classical physics. Quantum physics and the concept of tunneling means the ball could jump to the other side of the hill with ease or even be found inside the hill – or on both sides of the hill at once.”_

The previous example of a stable virtual particle state is what inspired the concept of building a carbon nano-tube wafer seat designed to trap helium or other gases with super-fluid properties. I imagined that provided a similar particle seat for helium you might go on to design the wafer to provide an atom thick sheet of helium that when cooled might provide a stable internal voltage as found in experiments with particle sheets of super-fluids.

It does not seem a big question of getting trapped particles into nano-tube cavities specifically designed to trap them though that may be a question further addressed. The question is can the voltage generated in the super-fluid sheet be amped up and if so how? I have somewhat assumed that as virtual particles states are present in quantum tunnelling this may be taken advantage of and examined as an example virtual particle states as a whole.

A new state of water, that’s exciting, bookmarks article.

CrazyNeutrino said:

A new state of water, that’s exciting, bookmarks article.

I wonder how snow fits in with quantum tunneling?

CrazyNeutrino said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

A new state of water, that’s exciting, bookmarks article.

I wonder how snow fits in with quantum tunneling?

You mean the kaleidoscopic individuality of snowflakes thing?

Postpocelipse said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

A new state of water, that’s exciting, bookmarks article.

I wonder how snow fits in with quantum tunneling?

You mean the kaleidoscopic individuality of snowflakes thing?

more of how water, other stuff is communicating with itself at any pressure

patterns are forming at extreme pressures, maybe that itself could be formed into a battery design

This is indeed very interesting, though the journalist is stretching it to say that this is a new “state” of matter.

dv said:

This is indeed very interesting, though the journalist is stretching it to say that this is a new “state” of matter.

Sure but! interesting and can we apply it wink nidge?

dv said:

This is indeed very interesting, though the journalist is stretching it to say that this is a new “state” of matter.

what could you observe from a wafer of this Beryl? Could it be put into superfluid state?

dv said:

This is indeed very interesting, though the journalist is stretching it to say that this is a new “state” of matter.

incidentally, there was an article a while back on 4th water state in nano-flows of near 0 water. something else that made me think when I read about this natural example.

For some reason I remember the article including a reference to this tunnelling state possibly being present in heavy star-cores but that seems to have been borrowed from another article by my memory.

I did wonder if water under enough pressure would form a different form of matter as both a liquid and a solid

Cymek said:

I did wonder if water under enough pressure would form a different form of matter as both a liquid and a solid

Provided it is in a molecular trap it has to. This is what I am implying with a nano-tube wafer.

Quantum tunneling allows faster than light motion, so does that mean that here water molecules can travel faster than light?

mollwollfumble said:

Quantum tunneling allows faster than light motion, so does that mean that here water molecules can travel faster than light?

It will be interesting to see where this goes.

CrazyNeutrino said:

mollwollfumble said:

Quantum tunneling allows faster than light motion, so does that mean that here water molecules can travel faster than light?

It will be interesting to see where this goes.

Design the molecular trap seat wafer and you will get a patent….

Quantum tunneling allows faster than light motion…

it does? no “motion” involved. the particle changes position without traversing the intervening space.

ChrispenEvan said:

Quantum tunneling allows faster than light motion…

it does? no “motion” involved. the particle changes position without traversing the intervening space.

similar to the instantaneous communication of entangled particles………

he he. I’m wondering if the “Black Sun Disc” described as a gift to a Babylonian King and possible source of power might have something to do with this stuff incidentally……..

….. bump for KJW’s thoughts…….