MATERIALS SCIENCE AND CHEMISTRY

Water is called the substance of life: it covers most of the planet, it constitutes the largest fraction of our body, we drink it every day. Water actively participates in most chemical processes in nature, and will be the source of Hydrogen as we transition to clean and renewable energy. Surprisingly, and despite its abundance and importance, water is still poorly understood. In fact, more than 100 anomalous properties of water are known, water ice floating on liquid water being the most eye-catching one. The origin of the complexity is the subtle forces between water molecules, which derive from electrostatic, repulsive, hydrogen bonding, and van der Waals interactions. Getting the balance between these forces right is key for all of soft…