Lifetime of superheated water in a micrometric synthetic fluid inclusion

Mouna El Mekki (1) , Claire Ramboz (1) , Laurent Perdereau (1) , Kirill Shmulovich (2) , Lionel Mercury (1)

1 ISTO - Institut des Sciences de la Terre d'Orléans
2 Institute of Experimental Mineralogy

A synthetic pure water fluid inclusion presenting a wide temperature range of metastability (Th - Tn ≈ 50°C; temperature of homogenization Th = 144°C and nucleation temperature of Tn = 89°C) was selected to make a kinetic study of the lifetime of an isolated microvolume of superheated water. The occluded liquid was placed in the metastable field by isochoric cooling and the duration of the metastable state was measured repetitively for 7 fixed temperatures above Tn. Statistically, measured metastability lifetimes for the 7 data sets follow the exponential Reliability distribution, i.e., the probability of non nucleation within time t equals . This enabled us to calculate the half-life periods of metastability τ for each of the selected temperature, and then to predict τ at any temperature T > Tn for the considered inclusion, according to the equation τ(s) = 22.1 × e1.046×ΔT , (ΔT = T - Tn). Hence we conclude that liquid water in water-filled reservoirs with an average pore size ≈ 104 µm3 can remain superheated over geological timelengths (1013s), when placed in the metastable field at 24°C above the average nucleation temperature, which often corresponds to high liquid tensions (≈ -50 MPa).

Keywords: microthermometry; experimental kinetics; microvolumes; pure water; natural systems

Domains: Geophysics [physics.geo-ph]; Geophysics [physics.geo-ph]; Global Changes

Mouna El Mekki, Claire Ramboz, Laurent Perdereau, Kirill Shmulovich, Lionel Mercury. Lifetime of superheated water in a micrometric synthetic fluid inclusion. Metastable Systems under Pressure, Springer Verlag, pp.279-292, 2010. ⟨insu-00460565⟩