{"id":30530,"date":"2025-06-26T09:05:08","date_gmt":"2025-06-26T09:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=30530"},"modified":"2025-06-26T09:28:16","modified_gmt":"2025-06-26T09:28:16","slug":"heres-another-use-for-ice-creating-secret-codes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=30530","title":{"rendered":"Here\u2019s Another Use for Ice: Creating Secret Codes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Scientists have devised a way of writing and storing messages by creating patterns of air bubbles in sheets of ice.<\/p>\n

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Different bubble shapes forming in ice during the experiment.<\/span>Shoa et al., Cell Reports Physical Science 2025<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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A new study by Chinese, Korean and Czech scientists points to a novel way of writing and storing messages: creating patterns of air bubbles in sheets of ice. While the researchers aren\u2019t expecting you to ditch your smartphone, their study speaks to the remarkable properties of frozen water.<\/p>\n

\u201cI could see it showing up in a James Bond movie,\u201d said Robin E. Bell, an expert in ice sheet dynamics at Columbia and a former president of the American Geophysical Union. Dr. Bell, who was not involved in the new study, pictured a scene in which secret plans involving a submarine are encoded in an ice cube and are in danger of being discovered. \u201cSo you turn it into a smoothie or something,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

But the idea is more than an exercise in frivolity, said Mengjie Song, an expert in thermodynamics at the Beijing Institute of Technology and one of the lead authors of the new study, published on June 18 in the scientific journal Cell Reports Physical Science<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a totally new method for humans to record information,\u201d Dr. Song said. In his view, there could be \u201cmany, many applications around this work.\u201d For instance, it could be used to help devise more accurate models for de-icing power lines, airplanes and high-speed trains. A clearer grasp of how ice bubbles form could also help scientists better understand the thermal and mechanical properties of bricks made from lunar soil<\/a>, which could be used to build moon bases. (Scientists have been researching the possibility of fashioning bricks from Martian soil<\/a> for almost a decade.) Trained to recognize patterns in ice bubbles, artificial intelligence could help study glaciers for clues about past climate patterns, or to identify potential deposits of natural gas.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Researchers acknowledged, however, that much more work would have to be done to make such applications feasible. \u201cIce is an ancient substance that permeates every aspect of our lives,\u201d Dr. Song said. \u201cThere are many unsolved mysteries waiting for us to explore.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The English letters F and L are translated into Morse code by manipulating bubble layers in two cells.<\/span>Shoa et al., Cell Reports Physical Science 2025<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
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Scientists have devised a way of writing and storing messages by creating patterns of air bubbles in sheets of ice.Different bubble shapes forming in ice during the experiment.Shoa et al., Cell Reports Physical Science 2025A new study by Chinese, Korean and Czech scientists points to a novel way of writing and storing messages: creating patterns of air bubbles in sheets of ice. While the researchers aren\u2019t expecting you to ditch your smartphone, their study speaks to the remarkable properties of frozen water.\u201cI could see it showing up in a James Bond movie,\u201d said Robin E. Bell, an expert in ice sheet dynamics at Columbia and a former president of the American Geophysical Union. Dr. Bell, who was not involved in the new study, pictured a scene in which secret plans involving a submarine are encoded in an ice cube and are in danger of being discovered. \u201cSo you turn it into a smoothie or something,\u201d she said.But the idea is more than an exercise in frivolity, said Mengjie Song, an expert in thermodynamics at the Beijing Institute of Technology and one of the lead authors of the new study, published on June 18 in the scientific journal Cell Reports Physical Science.\u201cIt is a totally new method for humans to record information,\u201d Dr. Song said. In his view, there could be \u201cmany, many applications around this work.\u201d For instance, it could be used to help devise more accurate models for de-icing power lines, airplanes and high-speed trains. A clearer grasp of how ice bubbles form could also help scientists better understand the thermal and mechanical properties of bricks made from lunar soil, which could be used to build moon bases. (Scientists have been researching the possibility of fashioning bricks from Martian soil for almost a decade.) Trained to recognize patterns in ice bubbles, artificial intelligence could help study glaciers for clues about past climate patterns, or to identify potential deposits of natural gas.Researchers acknowledged, however, that much more work would have to be done to make such applications feasible. \u201cIce is an ancient substance that permeates every aspect of our lives,\u201d Dr. Song said. \u201cThere are many unsolved mysteries waiting for us to explore.\u201dThe English letters F and L are translated into Morse code by manipulating bubble layers in two cells.Shoa et al., Cell Reports Physical Science 2025We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30532,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30530","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30530"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30530\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30535,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30530\/revisions\/30535"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/30532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}