Nature Communications (May 2021)

Motion of water monomers reveals a kinetic barrier to ice nucleation on graphene

  • Anton Tamtögl,
  • Emanuel Bahn,
  • Marco Sacchi,
  • Jianding Zhu,
  • David J. Ward,
  • Andrew P. Jardine,
  • Stephen J. Jenkins,
  • Peter Fouquet,
  • John Ellis,
  • William Allison

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-23226-5
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 12, no. 1
pp. 1 – 8

Abstract

Read online

The dynamics of water molecules at interfaces controls natural and artificial processes, but experimental investigations have been challenging. Here the authors investigate water molecules on a graphene surface using helium spin-echo spectroscopy, and reveal a regime where freely mobile molecules undergo strong repulsive mutual interactions which inhibit ice nucleation.