13 ms·
Dry Water
- irrational 8y agoThis reads like a joke wikipedia article. Does anyone know if this is legitimate?
- diymaker 8y agoThe article does have some good sources. So I think it is legitimate.
- logifail 8y agoWhy are there no references to the original discovery, the patent(s), or the "snatching" by "cosmetic companies"? The link to the Daily Telegraph is broken ( https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/7964109/Scientists-create-dry-water.html https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/7964109/Sci... instead of https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/7964109/Scientists-create-dry-water.html https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/796410... ) If it was rediscovered at a university in 2006, why are there no publications from that year? At least the ACS is an authoratative source, perhaps that deserves a link? https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/pressroom/newsreleases/2010/august/dry-water-could-make-a-big-splash-commercially.html https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/pressroom/newsreleases/20...
- adrianN 8y agoWhy wouldn't it be? The mechanism to create it sounds very plausible.
- sooper 8y agoIt may well do, but then so do the best jokes / satire.
- dmitrygr 8y agohttps://www.forbes.com/sites/parmyolson/2010/08/27/what-is-dry-water/#43c089e24eaa https://www.forbes.com/sites/parmyolson/2010/08/27/what-is-d...
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- willis1314 8y agointeresting description
- semi-extrinsic 8y agoParticle stabilized emulsions are nothing surprising. And once you say nanoparticle stabilized emulsion, there's a plethora of everyday examples of air-water emulsions: shaving foam, whipped egg whites, aquafaba etc. Main difference here is that unlike e.g. proteins from egg white, the nano-silica particles do not stick to each other.
- lalaithion 8y agoCan you eat it?
- diymaker 8y agoGiven that it is coated in silica, my guess is no. It would be like eating 5% sand.
- adw 8y agoIt won't injure you. Doesn't mean you'll have much fun.
- idbehold 8y agoEdible !== Tasty
- mc32 8y agoA handful of wet sand, probably, though a little more tolerable.
- nathancahill 8y agoSo just a normal picnic at the beach then?
- adw 8y agoYeah, modulo particle size (https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2018/01/18/EFSA-raises-red-flag-for-silicon-dioxide-safety-over-nanoparticles# https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2018/01/18/EFSA-raises...) it's inert (used as an anticaking agent, additive number E551), but don't breathe it in; silicosis is not much fun. (The FDA limit is 2% by mass of product, but it's silica. Silica is _extremely_ chemically stable.)
- djsumdog 8y agoI was wondering if it was toxic or non-toxic. Silica gel packets say "do not eat" but they're in a ton of our food packaging so I'd hope they're non-toxic.
- Aardwolf 8y ago> Scientists consider that dry water will prove useful in the future to help fight global warming as it was found that it could store as much as three times more carbon dioxide than ordinary water over a similar length of time. But which is more expensive? 3x regular water, or 1x dry water?
- semi-extrinsic 8y agoIt's moot in any case, as nobody is considering storing CO2 by dissolving it in water. Supercritical fluid is where it's at.
- bopbop 8y agoSounds interesting - Do you have a link for that, or if you've got time could you explain?
- semi-extrinsic 8y agoThere's a lot of literature on this; Wikipedia has a decent starting point: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_sequestration#Geological_sequestration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_sequestration#Geologica... TL;DR: if you compress CO2 to above 73 bar, it becomes supercritical fluid, which has a density almost like water and which does not mix with water. If we inject this fluid into underground saline aquifers, we can trap it indefinitely. Basically exactly the reverse of producing oil and gas. In this case you're transporting and injecting pure CO2, not water with 0.1% - 1% CO2. It's been done at large scale since the mid-1990s, so we know it's viable. Lots of research and development on details/optimization still to be done, but we know it will work and we know we can scale it up.
- rthomas6 8y agoCould we combine this with some kind of carbon capturing process to reduce existing CO2 in the atmosphere?
- jondiggsit 8y agoWhat happens if you add liquid water?
- julienchastang 8y agoReminds me a of a quote from Steven Wright the American comedian: "I bought some powdered water, but I don't know what to add."
- tylerchilds 8y agoThe patent getting snatched up by cosmetics and then re-discovered almost 50 years later makes me wonder how many cool advancements have been lost to industries that couldn't find any value from them.
- tibbon 8y agoMDMA was originally patented 1912/1914 by Merck, but wasn't really applied for human usage until Dr Shulgin was working with it over 50 years later.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- vole 8y agoA similar thing occured with LSD. It was only manufactured by Sandoz until the patents expired and the quantities manufactured exploded.
- tinus_hn 8y agoIn many fields there are waves with the patent expiration cycle, for instance 3D printing or VR. As the patents expire there is a flurry of new research, everyone obtains new patents and it becomes impossible to create viable products again, until the patents expire and the cycle begins again.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- TimTheTinker 8y agoThat's very interesting, especially considering that patents were originally created to incentivize people to publish details of inventions so they could be publicly known and accessible in perpetuity. To better uphold their original purpose, perhaps the patent rights period should be shortened to 6 years or thereabouts.
- mcphage 8y ago> Dry water actually consists of 95% liquid water 95% by mass, or by volume?
- mycall 8y agoDo Not Eat
- djrogers 8y agoApparently one can make dry water with a blender - mix fine silica powder and water in a 1:19 ratio (by mass) and put it in a blender for a few minutes. I'm not going to risk my blender to try it, so who's first?
- gvb 8y agoBlenders can be replaced. I would worry more about silicosis. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicosis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicosis
- tdsamardzhiev 8y agoShould be ok unless you're making dry water as a daily job.
- rthomas6 8y ago"Water dust. Don't breathe this!"
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- TimTheTinker 8y agoOr pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. Been waiting for 25 years to use that word seriously. :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilico...
- eganist 8y agoYou've just unironically and contextually used what's currently the longest recognized word in the English language in an unforced manner. There has to be a prize for this.
- somethingroma 8y ago
- maxander 8y agoI wonder if this sort of silica coating could be an alternative to lipid-wall cells for silicate-based extraterrestrial life.
- s0rce 8y agoI assume you mean cell membranes (cell walls are in found in plants, fungi and bacteria and made from polysacharides). However, it seems like an impermeable wall is less the issue than trans-membrane structures which facilitate selective transport of different species (ions, molecules, etc).
- bonoboTP 8y agoWhat does species mean here? I haven't seen this usage before.
- s0rce 8y agoChemical species, basically just another term for a specific molecule/ion, there is a specific definition and it is apparently a bit more specific than what I thought: https://goldbook.iupac.org/html/C/CT01038.html https://goldbook.iupac.org/html/C/CT01038.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_species https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_species
- Gormisdomai 8y agodoesn't the fact that dry water balls absorb gasses imply that the membranes are at least partially permeable?
- s0rce 8y agoGood point, I guess its just somewhat porous. Still missing selective transport but we're reaching now.
- bbcbasic 8y agoHumans are dry water
- DINKDINK 8y agoSeems potentially useful for applications where you need a really high specific heat but different viscosity properties.
- jacobush 8y agoThe opposite of silica gel...
- dgudkov 8y agoHuh, the dehydrated water in Space Quest actually isn't that much of a joke.
- jamestimmins 8y ago"It can be used as a medium for volatile compounds, as materials stored within the dry water can be reduced to powder and stabilized – reducing not only the volatility of the substance, but also its weight for transport." Anybody know how it's possible that adding an additional substance to a chemical compound could decrease it's weight? Or does it just mean that less volatility means it can be transported in lighter containers?
- umvi 8y agoAssuming it's referring to lowering the density. Powder is less dense than liquid.
- jamestimmins 8y agoBut doesn't that just mean "It weighs less when you carry less"? That sounds like a truism.
- Someone 8y agoI think https://www.soci.org/chemistry-and-industry/cni-data/2010/22/dry-water-making-waves https://www.soci.org/chemistry-and-industry/cni-data/2010/22... answers that: Kept at -20°C, methane hydrate stores about as much methane per liter at room pressure as LNG in a compressed cylinder. So, instead of a heavy LNG cylinder, I guess you can do with a Dewar flask. Also, it seems it requires less energy and less time to create methane hydrate using dry ice. It likely also is advantageous that this gives you a ‘fluid’ that you can easily pump around.
- smsm42 8y agoI understood it as less total weight it requires, as instead of thick hermetically sealed tank needed to hold a volatile gas one could (probably) use a lighter container for less volatile substances. This of course assumes extracting the volatile substance back requires some procedure that can not happen by accident in transport.
- user5994461 8y agoIt doesn't say how to get the water back from the powder.
- olivier_martel 8y agoprobably by heating or crushing the powder.
- s0rce 8y agoYou could distill it off just like you distill normal water. Lowering the surface energy might also be a possibility. Might be able to introduce a powdered surfactant and then mix a bunch. Should then wet everything and you can sediment out the solids.
- kccqzy 8y agoI'm guessing but, boil it and condense? I'm guessing that the great increase in volume when reaching the boiling point is enough to rupture or destroy the coating.
- Rexxar 8y agoMy first guess would be to add more water.
- saudioger 8y agoDry water in cosmetics just takes a little compression — you rub it on your skin and you get the liquid within and some insubstantial amount of byproduct from the coating the liquid was stored in. Also, the coating is gas permeable, so you could boil the liquid out.
- DonHopkins 8y agoNow I'll have to get a Dry Water Dryer to go with my Hot Water Heater.
- umvi 8y agoHow does one reverse this process?
- jiveturkey 8y agoclearly, you run the blender in reverse
- s0rce 8y agoDistillation would work. Might be more efficient ways, I'm not sure.
- Hasz 8y agoHeat up the dry water. I imagine it's not much different that driving off the water from a hydrated mineral.
- ynniv 8y agoAlso see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_powder https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_powder
- thedirt0115 8y agoOk, stupid question time... can you turn it back into regular water, and how? "Just add water?"
- s0rce 8y agoI'm not sure whats normally done but I answered this above. You could distill it like normal water.
- acjohnson55 8y agoHow stable is it?
- arayh 8y agoThis appears to be a relevant patent: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20040028710A1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US20040028710A1/en Many are asking how to liquefy dry water. It is stated that you can liquefy dry water upon embrocation at the time of use. I assume this means applying the dry water to your skin and applying pressure and rubbing it.
- huhtenberg 8y agoOne step closer to Dehydrated Water from Space Quest I, an essential part of the Survival Kit... as I'm sure many of you here undoubtedly know.
- maxxxxx 8y agoOn hikes I always think there should be freeze dried water.
- zw123456 8y agoI wonder if it would make a good fire retardant. The water would heat up and make steam and burst out along with some CO2 trapped in it.
- TimTheTinker 8y agoI suspect that would at least partly depend on how hazardous it is to humans, especially under high temperature/pressure or as an inhalation hazard. Is there an MSDS for dry water?
- schoen 8y agoIt might be similar to silica dust: https://louisville.edu/micronano/files/documents/safety-data-sheets-sds/silica/ https://louisville.edu/micronano/files/documents/safety-data... I'm not sure about any differences due to the grain size or the presence of the water. (And maybe something unusual would happen when the water inside each droplet boils due to proximity to the flame -- I don't know what would happen as the droplets rupture.)
- nimbius 8y agoI work on an auto repair shop and was just thinking the same thing. We use a high pressure foam for fire suppression currently. The vendor says its a mix of soap, water, and co2. Only used it once but man is it messy!
- barbegal 8y agoIt wouldn't be as good as Aerogel [1] which is a similar silica nano-particle based structure. It contains air as opposed to water so conducts very little heat. [1] http://www.aerogel.org/?p=1929 http://www.aerogel.org/?p=1929
- barbegal 8y agoMy understanding is that to produce dry water all you need is a fine enough super-hydrophobic substance. It doesn't have to be silica but we know how to produce hydrophobic silica nano-particles. The main property it has over traditional water is an increased water-gas interface which means it can absorb more gases and absorb them at a faster rate.
- daferna 8y agoThrowback to the greatest debate of all time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPDdRrMVEnA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPDdRrMVEnA
- trishmapow2 8y agoExpected 'is water wet', was pleasantly surprised.
- orf 8y agoThis is amazing. They both give pretty compelling arguments. Can anyone else throw anything else into the ring? Is a fish wet?
- qudat 8y agoThere's water in the air, so everything in the air is actually wet based on that line of reasoning.
- SpaceGorilla 8y agoAre Kanye's fish sticks wet?
- dsnuh 8y agoI've seen arguments that water is a form of ash, since it is already oxidized and cannot be combusted (I guess in pure flourine it can). So I guess one could argue that fish are covered in ashes.
- mrfusion 8y agoWould this be useful for terraforming Venus?
- thehnguy 8y agoMy vitamix spins fast enough . . .
- wemdyjreichert 8y agoPowdered water... Just add water.
- Synaesthesia 8y agoI wonder how hard it is
- tjmc 8y agoSeems reasonable that you could also create dry heavy water. Could that be useful as a moderator for nuclear waste if mixed with powdered radioactive material?
- mullikine 8y agoWe must message Cody to ask him to please make and consume some dry water, for our sakes. As he has already done with heavy water, last year... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXHVqId0MQc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXHVqId0MQc
- ncmncm 8y agoNext they'll tell us there's such a thing as "wet towels".
- userbinator 8y agoDry water also has applications for the transportation and storage of dangerous materials. It can be used as a medium for volatile compounds, as materials stored within the dry water can be reduced to powder and stabilized – reducing not only the volatility of the substance, but also its weight for transport That reminds me of how acetylene is stored for transport --- dissolved in acetone, which is then absorbed into a porous nonflammable substance.
- stevespang 8y agoWhat happens if you freeze it - - or, if you put it under supercriticality, such as supercritical CO2 ? Applications towards aerogels ?
- jhabdas 8y agoBackpacker arrested in the middle east in an anpparent attempt to smuggle beauty products once thought to contain explosive substances through a security checkpoint at the Qatar airport.
- willis1314 8y agointeresting description
- DyslexicAtheist 8y agome: "water is wet." internet: not necessarily, ...
- SmellyGeekBoy 8y agoOT - but what is with all the idiotic comments in here?
- kbart 8y agoYou are not helping by posting another pointless comment (or do you really want to start another round of endless 'HN is becoming reddit'?). To express your disapproval, just use downvote instead.