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If Jupiter and the Sun both formed directly from the same well-mixed proto-solar nebula, then their atmospheric compositions should be similar. However, direct sampling of Jupiter's troposphere indicates that it is enriched in elements such…
It is surprisingly difficult to freeze water. Almost all ice that forms under "mild" conditions (temperatures > -40 degrees Celsius) requires the presence of a nucleating agent - a solid particle that facilitates the freezing process - such…
When a drop containing colloidal particles evaporates on a surface, a circular stain made of these particles is often observed due to an internal flow toward the contact line. To hinder this effect, several approaches have been proposed…
Besides the use as cold matrix for spectroscopic studies, superfluid helium droplets have served as a cold environment for the synthesis of molecules and clusters. Since vibrational frequencies of molecules in helium droplets exhibit almost…
The current Venus climate is largely regulated by globally-covered concentrated sulfuric acid clouds from binary condensation of sulfuric acid (H2SO4) and water (H2O). To understand this complicated H2SO4-H2O gas-cloud system, previous…
Molecular clouds are supported by thermal pressure, magnetic pressure, and turbulent pressure. Each of these can be modeled with a polytropic equation of state, so that overall the total pressure is the sum of the individual components. We…
We use a newly commissioned rapid expansion aerosol chamber (REACh) facility to study the homogeneous nucleation of water vapor to form liquid droplets. We perform high-speed measurements to track the partitioning of water into vapor and…
We investigate the evolution of dusty gas clouds falling into the centre of an active Seyfert nucleus. Two-dimensional high-resolution radiation hydrodynamics simulations are performed to study the fate of single clouds and the interaction…
Positively charged cluster ions of phosphorus were formed upon electron ionization of doped helium nanodroplets. The vapors of red phosphorus and a phosphate sample were picked up into neutral and charged helium nanodroplets. Independent on…
In a changing climate, a key role may be played by the response of convective-type cloud and precipitation to temperature changes. Yet, it is unclear if precipitation intensities will increase mainly due to modified thermodynamic forcing or…
Storms operated by moist convection and the condensation of $\rm CH_{4}$ or $\rm H_{2}S$ have been observed on Uranus and Neptune. However, the mechanism of cloud formation, thermal structure, and mixing efficiency of ice giant weather…
Acoustic cavitation is known to trigger ice nucleation in supercooled water. Several competing and still debatable mechanisms have been proposed in the literature and are related to the pressure field in the vicinity of the bubble at the…
Heterogeneous nucleation is central to many familiar first-order phase transitions such as the freezing of water and the solidification of metals, and it can also play a crucial role in cosmology. We examine nucleation seeded by preexisting…
Observational evidence from local star-forming regions mandates that star formation occurs shortly after, or even during, molecular cloud formation. Models of the formation of molecular clouds in large-scale converging flows have identified…
To constrain the properties of the first stars with the chemical abundance patterns observed in metal-poor stars, one must identify any non-trivial effects that the hydrodynamics of metal dispersal can imprint on the abundances. We use…
When a droplet is brought in contact with an undercooled surface, it wets the substrate and solidifies at the same time. The interplay between the phase transition effects and the contact-line motion, leading to its arrest, remains poorly…
Ubiquitous, yet elusive to a complete understanding: Tiny, warm clouds with faint visual signatures play a critical role in Earth's energy balance. These "twilight clouds", as they are sometimes called, form under weak updraft conditions.…
The relaxation of photoexcited nanosystems is a fundamental process of light-matter interaction. Depending on the couplings of the internal degrees of freedom, relaxation can be ultrafast, converting electronic energy in a few fs, or slow,…
Monodisperse granular flows often develop regions with hexagonal close packing of particles. We investigate this effect in a system of inelastic hard spheres driven from below by a "thermal" plate. Molecular dynamics simulations show, in a…
In experiments where ultraviolet light produces aerosols from trace amounts of ozone, sulphur dioxide, and water vapour, the number of additional small particles produced by ionization by gamma sources all grow up to diameters larger than…