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Water vapor, water vapour or aqueous vapor is the gaseous phase of water. It is one state of water within the hydrosphere. Water vapor can be produced from the evaporation or boiling of liquid water or from the sublimation of ice. Water vapor is transparent, like most constituents of the atmosphere. [1]
Even if it is cold enough to form amorphous ice, crystalline ice will form if the flux of water vapor onto the substrate is less than a temperature-dependent critical flux. [169] This effect is important to consider in astrophysical environments where the water flux can be low.
Comparison of phase diagrams of carbon dioxide (red) and water (blue) showing the carbon dioxide sublimation point (middle-left) at 1 atmosphere. As dry ice is heated, it crosses this point along the bold horizontal line from the solid phase directly into the gaseous phase. Water, on the other hand, passes through a liquid phase at 1 atmosphere.
As snowflakes and hail, ice is a common form of precipitation, and it may also be deposited directly by water vapor as frost. The transition from ice to water is melting and from ice directly to water vapor is sublimation. These processes plays a key role in Earth's water cycle and climate.
The symmetric shapes are due to depositional growth, which is when ice forms directly from water vapor in the atmosphere. [5] Small spaces in atmospheric particles can also collect water, freeze, and form ice crystals. [6] [7] This is known as nucleation. [8] Snowflakes form when additional vapor freezes onto an existing ice crystal. [9] [10]
Familiar examples are the melting of ice or the boiling of water (the water does not instantly turn into vapor, but forms a turbulent mixture of liquid water and vapor bubbles). Yoseph Imry and Michael Wortis showed that quenched disorder can broaden a first-order transition. That is, the transformation is completed over a finite range of ...
Water vapour from humid winter-air deposits directly into a solid, crystalline frost pattern on a window, without ever being liquid in the process. Deposition is the phase transition in which gas transforms into solid without passing through the liquid phase. Deposition is a thermodynamic process.
Water vapor interacting with a water droplet may be saturated, at 100% relative humidity, when interacting with a water droplet, but the same amount of water vapor would be supersaturated when interacting with an ice particle. [30] The water vapor will attempt to return to equilibrium, so the extra water vapor will condense into ice on the ...