A team including Pitt CRC collaborator John Keith has developed a liquid polymer — a large molecule created by joining many smaller molecules — that solidifies when mixed with water at room temperature, in effect raising the water’s freezing point from 32 degrees Fahrenheit to roughly 100 degrees Fahrenheit, 

This phenomenon seems to defy the second law of thermodynamics, explains Keith, assistant professor of chemical and petroleum engineering and Richard King Mellon Faculty Fellow in Energy at Pitt’s Swanson School of Engineering..

“When you mix two pure components together, the entropy (or the degree of disorder), always increases. That disorder almost always causes mixtures to have a lower freezing point than either of the components individually, not higher.”

This time lapse video shows the polymer (known as polyoxacyclobutanewater) mixing with water during a 24-hour period in room temperature conditions. (Courtesy of Sachin Velankar, associate professor of chemical and petroleum engineering and a collaborator on the project.)

Read more at "From Sci-Fi to Real Life: Newly Discovered Substance Changes the Behavior of Water"

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