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Updated: Jul 17, 2026

Probing the Structure and Dynamics of Interfacial Water with Scanning Tunneling Microscopy and Spectroscopy
Published on: May 27, 2018
Anomalous behavior of proton zero point motion in water confined in carbon nanotubes
G Reiter1, C Burnham, D Homouz
1Physics Department, University of Houston, 4800 Calhoun Road, Houston, Texas 77204, USA.
Abstract:
The momentum distribution of the protons in ice Ih, ice VI, high density amorphous ice, and water in carbon nanotubes has been measured using deep inelastic neutron scattering. We find that at 5 K the kinetic energy of the protons is 35 meV less than that in ice Ih at the same temperature, and the high momentum tail of the distribution, characteristic of the molecular covalent bond, is not present. We observe a phase transition between 230 and 268 K to a phase that does resemble ice Ih. Although there is yet no model for water that explains the low temperature momentum distribution, our data reveal that the protons in the hydrogen bonds are coherently delocalized and that the low temperature phase is a qualitatively new phase of ice.
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