Instability of quasi-liquid on the edges and vertices of snow crystals

TL;DR

This paper theoretically demonstrates that quasi-liquid layers exist on snow crystal edges and vertices within a specific temperature range, become unstable at high supersaturation, and drive crystal growth instability.

Contribution

It introduces a theoretical model explaining the instability of quasi-liquid layers on snow crystal edges and vertices, linking it to morphological growth behaviors.

Findings

Quasi-liquid exists on edges and vertices between -4C and -22C.

Unstable quasi-liquid layers grow indefinitely above critical supersaturation.

Overflow of quasi-liquid causes morphological instability in snow crystals.

Abstract

In this paper, we show theoretically that there exists quasi-liquid on the edges and vertices of snow crystals between -4C and -22C, while the basal and prism faces have no quasi-liquid layers. Investigating the macroscopic theory of quasi-liquid and applying to the edges and vertices of the crystal, we find that the quasi-liquid becomes unstable above the critical supersaturation point, which is above the water saturation point. The thickness of this unstable quasi-liquid layer continues growing indefinitely. We interpret this behavior as corresponding to continuous production and overflow onto neighboring faces in a real system. We hypothesize that the unstable growth of snow crystals originates from the edges and vertices, and it is due to the overflow of quasi-liquid from the edges and vertices onto the neighboring faces, which are rough and lack quasi-liquid. Our hypothesis accounts for the qualitative behavior of the relations between the morphological instability and the water saturation in the snow phase diagram.