The puzzling statistical physics of liquid water

Although H2O has been the topic of considerable research since the beginning of the century, the peculiar physical properties are still not well understood. We discuss recent experiments and simulations relating to the hypothesis that, in addition to the known critical point in water, there exists a “second” critical point at low temperatures. In particular, we discuss very recent measurements of the compression-induced melting and decompression-induced melting lines of high-pressure forms of ice. We show how knowledge of these lines enables one to obtain an approximation for the Gibbs potential G(P; T ) and the equation of state V (P; T ) for water, both of which are consistent with the possible continuity of liquid water and the amorphous forms of solid water. We also comment on some of the evidence that is equally consistent with other scenarios for the behavior of liquid water. c © 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.