AMSTERDAM, Netherlands, Sept. 19 (UPI) -- Water in its liquid form is far more complex a substance than previously thought thanks to research conducted using an incredibly quick laser capable of capturing the activity of molecular bonds in sub-fractions of a second.
A team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research (MPI-P) in Germany and the Netherlands' FOM Institute AMOLF have been able to distinguish just how quickly water molecules can alter their bonds to other molecules. Such observations were previously impossible to observe due to the actions' swiftness, which is thought to take as little as a femtosecond -- or one quadrillionth of a second.