Tilting behavior of lamellar ice tip during unidirectional freezing of aqueous solutions

TL;DR

This study investigates the tilting behavior of lamellar ice tips during unidirectional freezing, revealing how growth tilt depends on velocity and solute, thus enhancing understanding of ice pattern formation.

Contribution

It provides the first in-situ analysis of lamellar ice tip tilting during directional solidification, clarifying the influence of growth conditions on tilt behavior.

Findings

Tilted ice growth is sensitive to pulling velocity.

Solute type affects ice tip tilting.

Intrinsic tilting behavior influences pattern formation.

Abstract

Freezing of ice has been largely reported from many aspects, especially its complex pattern formation. Ice grown from liquid phase is usually characteristic of lamellar morphology which plays a significant role in various domains. However, tilted growth of ice via transition from coplanar to non-coplanar growth in directional solidification has been paid little attention in previous studies and there is misleading explanation of the formation of tilted lamellar ice. Here, we in-situ investigated the variations of tilting behavior of lamellar ice tip under different conditions within a single ice crystal with manipulated orientation via unidirectional freezing of aqueous solutions. It is found that tilted growth of ice tips is sensitive to pulling velocity and solute type. These experimental results reveal intrinsic tilted growth behavior of lamellar ice and enrich our understanding in pattern formation of ice.