Just about everyone knows that water is H2O, meaning two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. What might surprise people is that scientists have never before been able to actually watch hydrogen and oxygen merge to become water. Until now.
Researchers from Northwestern University, Illinois came up with a new way to view and record gas molecules in real time, which can be used to analyze them.
This method has the scientists trapping gas molecules within nanoreactors using glassy membranes. They can then view the area using a high-vacuum transmission electron microscope.
It is very complex and requires highly specialized equipment, but the fact is that it works. The researchers used this technique to watch the palladium, a rare metal, generate water from hydrogen and oxygen. It has long been known that palladium is able to rapidly generate water in this way, but nobody had ever seen it done, so the process was not well…
