What does snowflake look like under the microscope?May be different from what you think

Although we say that our current science is already very developed,

We know a lot and many things,

But the things around us

Did we really understand it?

Zhang Chao · National Observatory "China National Astronomy" magazine science science writer

Gezhi Campus 24 | April 15, 2020 Beijing

If you want to talk about people, it ’s a bit dreamy, maybe it will be realized.

In fact, I had such a dream when I was a kid. At that time, I watched a lot of cartoons. I remember that some cartoons will appear a lot of wonderful patterns, such as Chiugan-Guan Comet, such as small asteroid belt, and some pictures that are filmed with a microscope, which is amazing. At that time, I thought of one thing: when I could have a telescope or a microscope, it was great.

Later, when I went to work in the National Observatory, the telescope naturally did not worry, but the matter of microscope was really difficult.

In fact, we will use microscopes in middle school. We use the first microscope to look at onion cells and oral cells; in high school, we must also depend on silk division and decomposition division. I was in a hurry at the time. When could the teacher borrow me a microscope? Let me see how cool this magical micro world is. Unfortunately, there is no chance.

But then I found that if I bought a microscope at home, wouldn't all these things be solved?

After going to college, I really did such a thing and bought a microscope. So I saw such a beautiful picture at that time.

This is algae, a variety of algae, it swims in the water, and the various changes are very magical. This micro world is interesting. Next I will continue my exploration journey.

The micro world around us

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What do we explore? First of all, starting from our side, there will be some strange things around us. Although we are usually familiar with it, we don't know it in the micro world.

For example, this thing, this is not a pyramid, this is the micro -crystallization of salt, salt.

This is not oil painting, it is the crystallization of soy sauce.

For another example, it is not the feathers of the peacock. what is it? It is the crystallization of MSG.

This is not a fly. This thing is much smaller than a flies, called fruit flies. Fruit flies are a very important creature in creatures that have made great contributions to genetics.

The small fruit flies are about one or two millimeters. Its eyes are red, and the micro seems to be two large -eyed eyes. Note that it is compounded. Each eye is composed of many small units, which is very fun.

The mosquito is like this, but I didn't expect it. The eyes of the mosquito were particularly beautiful and colorful.

After reading this picture, I understand one thing. What's the matter, have you found that the mosquitoes in recent years have become more and more refined and difficult to fight. I remember that when I was a kid, I grabbed mosquitoes and patted mosquitoes at all. Now when the mosquito sees me, a good guy, perform two skills: the first hidden, I do n’t know where to fly, no more; the second skill, fold the head and fly, this is our long -term use of electric mosquito shoots. They have touched ejaculation.

Look at the compound eyes of this mosquito, the parcels are full, so it sees people without a dead corner. You try to catch a mosquito leg, you can't catch it. Therefore, it is very clear to look at its biological characteristics and clearly.

Another example is this? Ant. Two -eye on both sides, like Erlang God, three monocular.

For another example, this is a spider, its name should be crab spider, like crab spiders.

This spider is more fun. We see that each spider's expression is not the same. For example, the picture above is very cute, and the following is the same. You say that the same spider is the same. How can the expression difference?

In fact, if you analyze and analyze their looks and some of their habits, you will find that this matter is really fun. For example, what is the habit of this spider just now? It likes ambush hunting. For example, when you stay on a flower, the body color changes, which is almost the same as the flower. Then waited, waiting for the prey to catch it.

The following is not. This kind of spider is called a spider. It does not connect to the Internet and will jump to hunt. In other words, it is a spider active hunting. Its eyes are a bit different, and the front two are like headlights. Why do you grow like this?

You can interact with me and do a small experiment. First of all, everyone stretched out one finger and put it in front of us; then we closed one eye, and then poke the fingers that stretched out with the fingers of the other hand. Poke a few more times, you will find that sometimes you seem to be able to judge the position of your fingers, and you will poke. What's going on?

You see, our two eyes are useful. We have two eyes to judge the distance of an object and make accurate positioning.

So what scene will we see on the African prairie? An antelope rushing in front of it, and a leopard chased madly. Didn't you see antelope looking back at the leopard chasing? Because the eyes of antelope are on both sides, its eyes are very large. But leopard is not. In order to accurately locate the prey, it needs to look at it before hunting. In the micro -map scene, the two of them are distinguished by the differences.

Many people in the world like to collect sand in various places. This is a sand from Indonesia Beach, with the remains of many small animals in it. For example, the three forks are sponge, which looks like a carrot. It is coral, and there are pores like dumplings.

This is called Xingsha, which is also a beach accumulated by pores.

This is inland sand, they come from Gobi Beach, and there are some small agate balls inside.

For another example, this is the sand next to the volcanic mouth lake with a very crystal and beautiful granules of olive crystals.

Other volcanic sources are more beautiful, just like gems, great.

Unpopular relationship with snowflakes

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Therefore, there is a microscope resting around, and it will never think that life is boring and tasteless. You will explore many unknown things.

What do I like the most? It is a snowflake that falls from the sky.

But shooting snowflakes is much more difficult than the front of the front. Why? Let's think about it, what will happen to the snowflake? melted. How do I go to shoot this?

At that time, I did a period of observation at the Xinglong Observation Station of the National Observatory. One night watching the sky is good, a huge circle appeared on the edge of the moon. When I saw it, what was this called? "The moon halo is even more rainy, and the sun is windy at noon." This large circle is a kind of atmospheric light, it tells us that we are going to change.

So I paid a special attention that night, and it was snowing in the middle of the night. Hurry up the telescope and the dome to protect the equipment.

Well, what do you do this night? Nothing to do. At that time, I would like to try the next experiment to see if I can take the snowflakes.

So I took a microscope at that time. This microscope looked at it, but after a simple modification, I could take a great image. Because it was very, very cold at the time, I don't have to worry about the snowflakes on the microscope immediately. As a result, I really saw some great scenes.

Don't be deceived by me. How can you see the growth of snowflakes under a microscope? In fact, this is the process of snowflakes I saw slowly, and this video is upside down. Therefore, it was very stunning at the time. I saw a variety of shapes of snowflakes slowly melted in my vision, or sublimated, which was very beautiful. At the beginning, I looked like this snowflake, but later I found that if I carry this microscope out and go to various places to find snow, it feels more refreshing. Every place is not the same.

For example, once in Beijing, about ten years ago, there was a heavy snow, and this heavy snow was about two days and one night. From beginning to end, I started monitoring the shape of this snowflake.

The first snowflake was like this. Look at these one by one, like a very delicate hexagonal plate, there are some patterns on it, and there are some small bubbles inside, forming a magical structure.

Then after a while of snowflakes turned, it turned like this. All kinds of complicated small structures have emerged. Some are like lace lace, some look like a rudder, some like the leaves of a fern plant, and some grow a small fan at the top.

The monitoring changed again, and each branch became wide.

The monitoring changed again.

This snow brought me a lot of gains. But I have not been there, and I went to Xinjiang to chase several times.

There are few people in this place now, which is in the Tianshan Guozigou in Xinjiang.

You can see that the snow on the road is very, very thick, and the car is blocked for five hours.

At that time, it was found that the snow there was not the same as Beijing. There was a poem: "Yanshan snowflakes are like a seat, and the film blows off Xuanyuantai." The heavy snow there was really like a big goose feathers.

What is the snow here? Its structure is more complicated than seeing in Beijing, and it is more developed to branches.

These snowflakes are slowly linked together, falling down, forming a huge snow film, which may have hundreds of thousands of small snowflakes.

But another time is more interesting. In Xinjiang, I have seen a colorful snowflake.

Someone said no, isn't snowflake transparent? We look at it with the naked eye, and the microscope is transparent.

In fact, it is really color in this snowflake. Its color is due to some interference colors produced by the air inside.

There are some snowflakes that look like this, which we are filming in the northeast. At that time, it was also very interesting. At that time, the temperature dropped to minus 20 degrees, which was too cold. When I was in Xinglong, I was usually minus a dozen degrees.

At that time, my strategy was to wear it hard. After wearing it, I couldn't let go. There are various warm stickers on the body and more than 20 warm stickers. Even so, it can only stay outside for about ten minutes.

The snowflakes in the northeast are more beautiful, and its structure has changed different changes from top to bottom.

(Sliding viewing the picture)

These are snowflakes shot in Changchun and Jilin in Northeast China.

Of course, some snowflakes are strange. You see how many small snowflakes on the upper right of this picture, have you pay attention?

Look at this, do you look like a person's special face? This is another type of snowflake, but we usually don't pay much attention to it.

Today, I will give you a brief demonstration, how do I shoot snowflakes.

Please see, this is a microscope. At this time I connect the microscope with the camera, and then connect the microscope and the computer together, and then let's take a look at what beautiful snowflakes will be found. Now there should be a black piece in the camera. I took a glass piece I used to shoot snowflakes and put it below.

Oops, it's not enough. It doesn't matter, I have a plastic bag here and a flashlight, which is on the "pop". Then I put it below, the following is the moment of witnessing miracles.

Did you see snowflakes? The middle one is pretty. To the left, there are many types of snowflakes around it. But these snowflakes are not the standard hexagonal we hexagon we see, right?

Are snowflakes hexagonal?

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Some people say that for snowflakes, we know two things: the first thing is that there are two snowflakes in the world exactly the same; another thing is that snowflakes are all hexagonal. Is it not? Sorry, it's really not like this.

For example, this picture is a more unsighting phenomenon, it is called the fantasy day. Note that there are two light spots on the left and right left and right in the sun. Did you see it? That is the fantasy day.

Who is the fantasy day? It is formed by them, and this type of snowflakes called bond or thread shafts. They are not hexagonal.

Some people also say, yes, not hexagonal, they are hexagonal or six -character.

Don't worry, in fact, there are many types of snowflakes. Only a few are this standard hexagonal, or the shape of six forks.

This table is a relatively famous category of snowflakes. It divides a total of more than 100 categories. Only one of them is a real hexagon.

Look here again, there are only a small part of the hexagonal snowflakes we are familiar with. The one in the middle is, the one on the left, there are a few below, and the others are not.

In addition, there are some more individuals, such as it. This is a snowflake just caught at the beginning of this year (2022).

I saw it at the time, this snowflake was good, triangle.

Some are three forks, and some are simply a triangle.

There are four corners and such four corners.

Is this so amazing? Intersection So that sentence is not right, "snowflakes are all six cents", not like this.

There are even twelve corners. Everyone pays attention to the snowflakes of these twelve corners. The first twelve corner is no problem, the second twelve corner, the third twelve corner, the fourth ... it seems that the two snowflakes are stacked together. Is there a possibility, the snowflakes of the twelve corners are actually formed by two hexagonal snowflakes together?

This problem also bothered me for a long time, but with the slow observation, it was found that this question gradually had an answer.

For example, watch this. This was a deep snowfall that made me remember in Beijing. At that time, I was working in Taita, and I was snowing at noon. I took a microscope to shoot. As a result, two colleagues said, "Zhang Chao, you say you usually shoot snowflakes, let me see how you shoot it. "I said," Okay, just look at it. "I took them down.

When I find a place, I start to use a microscope to connect the camera, and then let it cool. I didn't say this just now that this must be cooled for a while. If it is not cooled, it will be troublesome, and the snowflakes will go up.

At this time, there were two twelve -petal snowflakes that landed on a glass piece. This was not me, nor my PS, it fell together. I said this was too rare, and there were two twelve snowflakes falling down.

At this time, a friend next to me said, "Teacher Zhang, what are you on your arm?" I saw that there was a furry snowflake on my arm, and I couldn't see it clearly.

I said this, I use a spell -not spell, technology, we stick to snowflakes.

This technology is particularly careful. Generally speaking, the snowflakes are used to separate the snowflakes under the microscope or a small needle. At that time, I risked and used a glass to stick this snowflake. After sticking to the microscope, you guess, how many petals do this snowflake have? There are twenty -four petals.

Gifts from the cloud

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I have been observed and collected for more than ten years, and now there are thousands of snowflakes, but so far, when it is snowing, I still carry the equipment outside for shooting.

Because every snow will give me a different experience.

Sometimes I go out. After this snow comes down, it is completely irregular, not crystallized, and it looks not good at all. There is nothing good to wait for a snow; sometimes after snowing, there are very beautiful snowflakes. I have never seen the type of prosperity, and I have never seen it; sometimes like this, seeing some varieties I have never seen, it seems to get a very magical thing.

Although we are very developed now, we know a lot of things, but did we really understand the things around us?

Just like the astronomical I learned. Every day I still have the habit of watching the sky, using my mobile phone or a small camera to see the clouds in the sky. As long as I saw strange, I took a picture and made a record of heaven.

Sometimes I put on the window sill with a small glass to connect the tiny meteor dust from the sky. When the meteor passes through the atmosphere, some small particles will appear because of the combustion. This small particle is a tiny meteorite, which is very, very small. After it falls, it can be received and studied by us.

This is a gift from the sky, and the same snowflakes are like this. It is also a gift from a cloud. It tells us a lot of stories that happened by the high -level atmosphere.

So even if we still live on the ground now, we just look up at the sky, but we also have the same means to obtain these mysterious, unknown, from the sky.I think whether it is astronomy or the micro -photography I do, this kind of exploration and mysterious longing for unknown is probably the same as you.

So I also hope everyone, let's go together to explore the world that we have been ignored by us, but very mysterious.

Thanks!

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