On December 10th 2016, an international team of researchers at the University of Oxford announced that they had discovered what they are calling a second state of liquid water. According to the team's leader, Dr. Laura Maestro, the researchers were able to demonstrate that at a temperature between 40 and 60 degrees Celsius (104 and 140 degree Fahrenheit), liquid water changes to a different state, with a whole new set of properties.
According to Dr. Maestro, when water hits its crossover temperature, it switches between two states of liquid. This second liquid state takes two hydrogen atoms in the shape of an oxygen tip arrow, which is an unusual molecular structure. The new structure contains electrons that are distributed in a asymmetrical way. This keeps the oxygen side of each molecule negatively charged relative to the hydrogen.
Dr. Maestro and her team believes that this new second state of water is reminiscent of liquid crystals. If the researchers findings are confirmed, the molecules can be configured depending on the total energy of the matter. This could be useful in the development of new nano and biological technologies.
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