When someone talks about frozen water, they typically mean the ice cubes in a cold drink or the vast glaciers in Earth’s coldest corners. What most people don’t know, however, is that H2O molecules can arrange themselves into many different types, or phases, of ice with various structures. Researchers have discovered more than 20 of these phases, the latest of which—called Ice XXI—a team recently created under extreme pressure, allowing water to turn to ice at room temperature.

Chances are that all your encounters with frozen water—while trudging through slushy winter streets, perhaps, or treating yourself to cool summer lemonades—have been confined to one structural form of ice, dubbed Ih, with the h referring to its crystal lattice’s hexagonal nature. But there is so much more to ice than that.

Has the quest for room temperature superconductivity finally succeeded? Researchers at the University of Rochester (U of R), who previously were forced to retract a controversial claim of room temperature superconductivity at high pressures, are back with an even more spectacular claim. This week in Nature they report a new material that superconducts at room temperature—and not much more than ambient pressures.

Water and tourism woes at Lake Mead, a breakdown of the Inflation Reduction Act and a scientific discovery at UNLV.

Two years ago, a team of physicists synthesized a room-temperature superconducting material for the first time, making the material superconducting at 15°C under an extreme pressure of 267 GPa. Recently, the team published new research breaking the previous record, making the material appear superconducting at room temperature with only 91 GPa pressure.

Less than two years after shocking the science world with the discovery of a material capable of room-temperature superconductivity, a team of UNLV physicists has reproduced the feat at the lowest pressure ever recorded.

Less than two years after shocking the science world with the discovery of a material capable of room-temperature superconductivity, a team of UNLV physicists has upped the ante once again by reproducing the feat at the lowest pressure ever recorded.

Less than two years after shocking the science world with the discovery of a material capable of room-temperature superconductivity, a team of UNLV physicists has upped the ante once again by reproducing the feat at the lowest pressure ever recorded.