Firenze University Press www.fupress.com/substantia Feature Article …And All the World a Dream: Memory Outlining the Mysterious Temperature- Citation: E. Uskoković, T. Uskoković, V. Wu, V. Uskoković (2020) …And All Dependency of Crystallization of Water, a.k.a. the World a Dream: Memory Outlining the Mysterious Temperature-Depend- the Mpemba Effect ency of Crystallization of Water, a.k.a. the Mpemba Effect. Substantia 4(2): 59-117. doi: 10.13128/Substantia-895 Evangelina Uskoković1, Theo Uskoković1, Victoria Wu1,2, Vuk Received: Apr 04, 2020 Uskoković1,3,* Revised: May 31, 2020 1 Advanced Materials and Nanobiotechnology Laboratory, TardigradeNano, 7 Park Vista, Irvine, CA 92604, USA Just Accepted Online: Jun 05, 2020 2 MP Biomedicals, 9 Goddard, Irvine, CA 92618, USA 3 Published: Sep 12, 2020 Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California, Irvine, Engineering Gateway 4200, Irvine, CA 92697, USA Copyright: © 2020 E. Uskoković, T. *Corresponding author: [email protected]; [email protected]. Uskoković, V. Wu, V. Uskoković. This is an open access, peer-reviewed arti- cle published by Firenze University Abstract. Introduction Year 2019 marked the semi-centennial since the release of Cool?, Press (http://www.fupress.com/substan- a seminal paper by Mpemba and Osborne that demonstrated the counterintuitively tia) and distributed under the terms faster crystallization of warm water than the cold one when they are both cooled under of the Creative Commons Attribution the same conditions. Objective This docufiction piece celebrates the “cool” of the story License, which permits unrestricted around the discovery of this effect by taking the form of a play during which a scien- use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original tific study elucidating the mechanistic origins of this peculiar effect was performed and author and source are credited. discussed. Methods This play celebrating scientific research as a literal play takes place over the period of 24 hours on an autumn day in 2019 and is divided to four acts: the Data Availability Statement: All rel- noon (Act I), the afternoon (Act II), the night (Act III), and the sunrise (Act IV). It is evant data are within the paper and its interjected with diegetic musical lines that are sang by the muses in the alternate ver- Supporting Information files. sion and by the characters per se in this version, either acapella or to the tunes played Competing Interests: The Author(s) by an onstage radio. The protagonists of the play are mom and dad scientists on exile declare(s) no conflict of interest. from scientific institutions and their two children, an elementary school-age boy and a preschooler girl, implying the study’s strong educational character, alongside the philo- sophical and humanistic. Results Through the simple kinetic analyses of the crystalliza- tion of water and the melting of ice, but also more complex light scattering, optical absorbance, infrared imaging and X-ray diffraction analyses, the study provides obser- vations in support of the hypothesis that structural memory in the liquid state is a key factor explaining the Mpemba effect. As per this explanatory model, the increased polydispersity and delayed relaxation of cluster symmetries forming in the preheated water allow it to crystallize faster than the initially cold water. This is made possible either by the direct semblance of an unrelaxed population of high-temperature clusters to the space group of ice Ih or by preserving the dynamic conditions for cluster reor- ganization that shorten the stochastic search for configurations that facilitate the tran- sition to the solid state at or around the freezing point. Air cavities in the liquid phase, including micro- and nano-bubbles, are shown not to be responsible for the Mpemba effect. However, larger temperature gradients and densities of convection streams in the preheated water get partially preserved during cooling, acting as possible factors of influence that render the occurrence of this anomalous phenomenon feasible. Parallels with hydroxyapatite, the most abundant inorganic material in our bodies after water, Substantia. An International Journal of the History of Chemistry 4(2): 59-117, 2020 ISSN 2532-3997 (online) | DOI: 10.13128/Substantia-895 60 Evangelina Uskoković, Theo Uskoković, Victoria Wu, Vuk Uskoković were made during the discussion. Conclusions It is concluded that structural memory allows water to exhibit the Mpemba effect and that science belongs to the province of children of all ages. Keywords: crystallization, dialogue, DIY, indie, kinetics, memory, Mpemba effect, play, water. ACT I DAD: So said a dreamy boy when asked to dance at the ball. A minute later he’d see the girl of his dreams and (Indian summer. High noon. Sunshine. Impressionistic all the moons would jump out of their orbits and stars colors all around.) spin off their axes. DAUGHTER: Yay, ice-cream! SON: And what about Andromeda galaxy? When it starts colliding with the Milky Way, how will it look SON: Yummy ice-cream! like? MOM: Watch out guys, it will drip down the cone if you DAUGHTER: Swoosh-bash-smash! goof. It is hot out here. SON: Yoo-hoos-caboose! SON: Mom, what would happen if an asteroid, like B612, were to hit Jupiter? DAD: Actually, stars stand at such big distances from one another that they won’t even feel it. MOM: A solid rock colliding with a gaseous giant? MOM: Solitude paves way to shininess. SON: Not just any solid rock. A rock with two active volcanoes, one extinct volcano and a baobab tree and a DAUGHTER: Look-a-me, I’m in time capsule. rose.1 DAD: Time traveler, where are you heading today? MOM: Hard to tell. All I know is that Jupiter protects us Future or past? by attracting many asteroids and comets with its huge gravity and diverting them from the Earth. DAUGHTER: To history we go! DAD: A catcher in the rye it is. DAD: How far back in time? To say hi to Eskimo cur- lews? Or dire wolves? SON: What’s a catcher in the rye? MOM: Take a peek at the Earth forming from cosmic DAD: It is a child - or a grownup - standing on the edge dust? of a cliff and keeping other children playing chase in rye fields from falling down the cliff.2 This child, however, DAD: Climb the giant conifers that stood here and cannot play. It is a noble sacrifice that she or he must pierced the late Miocene sky? make to allow other children to play. SON: “Why do we need clocks when we never have the MOM: “A torch for me: let wantons light of heart tickle time? We’re here now”4 (♪♫♪). the senseless rushes with their heels, for I am proverb’d with a grandsire phrase; I’ll be a candle-holder, and look MOM: Guys, as you dream about spaceships and stars, on”.3 your ice-creams have dripped to the porch. SON: Look, the blob is making up the heart shape. 1 A. Saint-Exupery – “The Little Prince”, Reynal & Hitchcock, New York, NY (1943). DAUGHTER: The chocolate heart shape. 2 J. D. Salinger – “The Catcher in the Rye”, Little, Brown and Co., New York, NY (1951). 3 W. Shakespeare – “Romeo and Juliet”, Easton Press, Norwalk, CT 4 M. Nilsson – “Clocks”, In: History, Dark Skies Association, Berlin, Ger- (1597). many (2011). Memory Outlining the Mysterious Temperature-Dependency of Crystallization of Water 61 MOM: It really looks like a heart. How splendid. SON: He protected games? How cool. DAUGHTER: A discobery! DAUGHTER: A ‘puter games? Like Maniac Mansion? SON: It is just a blob, baby sister, not a discovery. MOM: More like wild animals. DAUGHTER: A discobery says I, the king of the jungle. DAD: Isn’t it what animals are here to teach us anyway? How to approach life as a game? Play as a route to the SON: I Mowgli, you Chil! world’s grandest discoveries. MOM: Chil? You mean, like “cool down”? MOM: That is indeed what puppies teach us: “that the more animals need to learn, the more they need to SON: No, I mean the brahminy kite5 who flies around play”.7 And not just puppies, but dolphins, chimps and and chirps in unknown, aerial languages. many other animals that are next of kin to our evolu- tionary lineage too. DAD: How cool. A gaze at the farthest, the most myste- rious, both the brightest and the darkest of it all brought DAD: Once I heard that they play for the sake of play- us here, at the doorstep of a discovery in a tiny drop of ing. chocolate ice-cream. SON: Like we, children do. MOM: All I know is that when “there’s poetry in an empty Coke can”6 (♪♫♪), life is at its most beautiful, even DAD: Purposelessly, in the “blue-skied” manner, which in this “burnt out caravan”. These petite discoveries mat- is, by the way, how the best discoveries are made. ter more than most things grownups ascribe greatness to in life. MOM: Animals have really taught us that playful behav- ior is at the root of learning. DAD: Actually, this chocolate ice-cream blob reminds me of a story. DAD: Does this mean that to enable a child to remain a child for its entire life is the only way to promote its SON: Ah, Dad, what story now? proper growing up, in spiritual and creatively expressive terms? DAD: The story behind the discovery of an effect known today by the name of a boy named Mpemba. MOM: Perhaps. Remember that unlike wolves, who sooner or later surpass the phase of puppyhood in their DAUGHTER: ‘Memba? development and become stern and serious individuals, so to speak, dogs dwell in the state of incessant puppy- DAD: No, not ‘Memba, but Mpemba.