Metastability of Liquid Water Freezing into Ice VII under Dynamic Compression.

The ubiquitous nature and unusual properties of water have motivated many studies on its metastability under temperature- or pressure-induced phase transformations. Here, nanosecond compression by a high-power laser is used to create the nonequilibrium conditions where liquid water persists well into the stable region of ice VII. Through our experiments, as well as a complementary theoretical-computational analysis based on classical nucleation theory, we report that the metastability limit of liquid water under nearly isentropic compression from ambient conditions is at least 8 GPa, higher than the 7 GPa previously reported for lower loading rates.