How do floating water bridges defy gravity?
The term "floating water bridge" may sound nonsensical, but it's the most logical name for a phenomenon that occurs when two beakers of water set slightly apart are zapped with high-voltage electricity and the water molecules jump across the gap to connect and form a thin thread of water. The molecular structure that suspends this liquid bridge has stumped scientists for over a century. Now, a team of scientists has peered into floating water bridges with high-energy x-rays using the Advanced Photon Source (APS) at Argonne National Laboratory. Their work, "Floating water bridges and the structure of water in an electric field," was published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Chelsea Whyte spoke with Brookhaven National Laboratory chemist John Parise, who worked with the team at APS to explore this unexplained phenomenon.