Certain salt crystals are normally cube-shaped, but can take on a new shape and grow on the surface of tiny water droplets.
Zhongping Zhang, Suhua Wang and their colleagues at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Hefei mixed a water-based solution of either sodium chloride or potassium chloride with cyclohexane and acetone. After shaking, hollow spheres formed that were made up of individual 'hopper-like' crystals of the salt (pictured). The spheres probably formed at the interface between the organic solvents and the water droplets that contained the salt.
The technique may produce new crystal structures for other water-soluble compounds, and could aid in understanding crystal growth mechanisms, the authors suggest.
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Crystals on water's edge. Nature 474, 8 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/474008a
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/474008a