Dynamical Crossover in Hot Dense Water: The Hydrogen Bond Role

We investigate the terahertz dynamics of liquid H2O as a function of pressure along the 450 K isotherm, by coupled quasielastic neutron scattering and inelastic X-ray scattering experiments. The pressure dependence of the single-molecule dynamics is anomalous in terms of both microscopic translation and rotation. In particular, the Stokes-Einstein-Debye equations are shown to be violated in hot water compressed to the GPa regime. The dynamics of the hydrogen bond network is only weakly affected by the pressure variation. The time scale of the structural relaxation driving the collective dynamics increases by a mere factor of 2 along the investigated isotherm, and the structural relaxation strength turns out to be almost pressure independent. Our results point at the persistence of the hydrogen bond network in hot dense water up to ice VII crystallization, thus questioning the long-standing perception that hydrogen bonds are broken in liquid water under the effect of compression.