is it possible to put enough pressure on water and turn it into a solid?

Question

i heard that the pressure on the molten rock near the core makes it into a solid.

Answer 1

If you examine a phase diagram for water:
http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/phase.html
you will notice the blue areas, which correspond to water's solid form, ice. Even at very high temperature, if you give it enough pressure, it will still form a solid.

Water incompressible? I think not. If a material was completely incompressible, the speed of sound in that material would be infinite. All materials are compressible. Water may be 15 times harder to compress than air, and can be reasonably approximated as incompressible for most applications, but it is not actually incompressible.

Answer 2

That lithiumdeuteride guy is right.

But watch out. When people say that water is incompressible (being a non-Newtonian fluid) this is also true...for pressures generally attainable on Earth. The reason that tectonic sheets can be forced to slide great distances over land is because of the "incompressible" water within shale layers where the faults develop. The water is able to support the weight of the entire countryside...while sliding! It's amazing really.

The pressures needed to make water solid must be combined with the correct temperatures, and that doesn't happen under anything remotely like "normal" conditions here on planet E. Some compounds, like methane for example, can be made solid by the pressures attained on the sea floor---but NOT water.

Hope this helps

Answer 3

Unfortunately, no one bothered to explain this to you, even the guys who got the right answer.

Unlike almost all other known liquids, water *expands* when it solidifies. With most liquids, applying sufficient pressure *forces* the liquid to *contract* into a solid state. This does not happen with water since it's solid state is actually more expansive than its liquid state. Note that there may be solids of water (other than normal ice) which are more dense than water, and perhaps that is what the two answers - apparently more knowledgeable than I - are speaking of when they say that it is possible under extreme conditions.

Jim, B.S. in Physics, John Carroll University

Answer 4

I have heard that water is incompressible all my life.
BUT....

The intense gravity of neutron stars have compressed all atoms out of existence - this includes all molecules (like water) because they are made of atoms.

Neutron stars have forced electrons to join protons to become neutral particles called neutrons - hence the name neutron star.

So the answer is literally YES, it is possible to compress water into a solid.

However, man does not have the capability to do this himself at this time, maybe he never will, who knows.

The deepest ocean is 7 miles deep near Japan in the Pacific ocean in the Marianna's trench.

A one inch square column of water 1 foot high weighs 0.433
pounds.

0.433 * 5280 * 7 / 2000 = 8 tons per square inch of water pressure at 7 miles deep. Water is still water at that great pressure.

Beside neutron stars or black holes, this ocean pressure
forces water molecules slightly closer together so that the
density of water at 7 miles deep is slightly more than 1.

This makes sea level a few inches lower than it would be without this slight compression. Of course this is far from making water a solid.

Answer 5

the radical "Cat's Cradle" by way of Kurt Vonnegut tells of a fictional crystal form of water noted as ice-9. in the story, while water comes into touch with ice-9, it crystallizes. some ice-9 receives into the sea and only approximately all the water in the worldwide is frozen.

Answer 6

Liquids are in a maximum state of compression and while displacable are not compressible. Otherwise, hydraulics wouldn't work. The hydraulic oil in a cylinder is effectively a liquid steel rod.

Answer 7

yea. you could do that. but i dont know how much pressure.

you can add pressure to a gas to turn it into a liquid too. :)

Answer 8

You heard wrong. Pressure will actually turn it into a gas.

Answer 9

The answer is NO. Water is not compressible.

Answer 10

No, but the reverse is true.