Encounters #1

(1)

Last weekend--Friday, the whole of Saturday, and the whole of Sunday--I was stuck inside the walls of my home because nature had decided to give my family a blizzard that brought over two feet of snow. At one point, I was looking at the way the snowflakes fell on the snow under. I was thinking about how these tiny little particles form. Along with this concept, I thought about another interesting concept this week while driving to school: how long it takes for all this snow to melt and why so long. These thoughts brought my mind to my Cell and Molecular Biology course, and what I had learned regarding something like this.

For the first thought: snow flakes form in the clouds as ice crystals when the air temperature in the clouds goes below freezing. There are water molecules in the air called water vapor, which stick together in these freezing temperatures, and form ice crystals. These ice crystals come together and when they're big enough, they form a snowflake.

The second thought relates to the melting of the snow after it has stopped snowing. When so many ice crystals or snow flakes are together, it is harder to break their hydrogen bonds apart (or melt) from each other, as opposed to if there are only a few snowflakes together. This concept can even be found true in water. Sublimation (solid to gas) is a common way for snow to melt. Snow also turns into liquid and melts if the temperature is still too cold. 

In class I had learned of the way water was made up and the hydrogen bonds and why water may sometimes take a long time to freeze or heat up. There are many things that happen everyday which relate to science!

Picture reference: 

(1) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b2/UK_snow_February_2,_2009_img008.jpg