Is it true that there are no identical snowflakes
Miscellaneous / / January 07, 2022
Don't say you never thought about it.
You have probably heard the statement that there cannot be two identical snowflakes in the world. They say they are unique - just like human fingerprints. How true is this?
Well, we've already dealt with prints: in one of our previous articles it turned outthat occasionally they do repeat themselves. History knowsS. A. Cole. More than Zero: Accounting for Error in Latent Fingerprint Identification / Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology at least 22 cases of their exceptional similarity in different people. We are done with criminology, we are moving on to meteorology.
Most of us know what snow is, except perhaps for readers from hot countries. For them, just in case, let's say: these are ice crystals that are formed from atmospheric moisture under the influence of cold.
Due to the chemical bonds created by the water, the snowflakes become hexagonalNo Two Snowflakes Alike - True or False / ThoughtCo, although they are rarely perfectly symmetrical. There are billions of different variations of them, and at first glance, they all seem unique.
Nevertheless, the same snowflakes can still form. In the laboratory, for sure.
Dr. Kenneth Libbrecht, professor of physics at California Institute of Technology, found a wayKenneth G. Libbrecht. Designer Snowflake / Caltech grow under a microscope snowflakes - almost complete copiesWho Ever Said No Two Snowflakes Were Alike? / The New York Times each other. The researcher affectionately called them twins. To do this, you just need to provide identicalK. G. Libbrecht. An experimental apparatus for observing deterministic structure formation in plate-on-pedestal ice crystal growth / Cornell University conditions for the transformation of water molecules (control temperature, humidity and air turbulence). Synthetic snowflakes grow in the same way as natural ones: they take from 15 minutes to an hour to form.
Video: Kenneth G. Libbrecht / Caltech
What is even more surprising, in the natural environment, the same frozen crystals also occasionally come across. The first in the Guinness Book of Records stories a recorded case of detecting such snowflakes. In 1988, Nancy Knight, a meteorologist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, foundFirst identical snow crystals / Guinness World Records two identical crystals, examining with a microscope samples collected during a storm in Wisconsin.
True, even such snowflakes will still differ somewhat at the molecular level. Physicist Ethan Siegel ExplainsAsk Ethan: Could You Have Two Perfectly Identical Snowflakes? / Forbes: to call objects exactly the same, it is necessary that they be identical down to subatomic particles. And this cannot be.
A typical snow crystal containsKenneth G. Libbrecht. Is it really true that no two snowflakes are alike? / Caltech about 10¹⁸ molecules of water (good old H₂O). And the number of configurations that they are able to make is almost infinite - there are more of them than atoms in the foreseeable The universe.
So the answer to the question whether there are identical snowflakes can be either positive or negative. When it is asked by a person who has nothing to do with the exact sciences, the answer is yes, there are. If a molecular physicist is talking to you, then no, all snowflakes are absolutely unique. However, for this smart guy, the two glasses from your granny's service will also be different.
Read also❄️
- 7 interesting facts about snow
- 7 facts you need to know about water
- TEST: What is this miracle of nature? Identify by photo!
I am a journalist with a passion for technology and science. Digging into Windows settings, making my regular TV smart, and reflashing my Android as a hobby. I am also interested in space, history, zoology and watch a lot of movies. I love to talk about crazy fan theories and debunk pseudoscientific myths. I have a fondness for Linux (but not enough to use it all the time).