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Fluid dynamics

How water explodes

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Micro-explosions triggered by the absorption of X-ray laser light in drops and jets of water result in shock waves and in rapid heating and expansion of the liquid — as now revealed in state-of-the-art experiments.

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Figure 1: Overlaid images showing the dynamics of a water film folding back on a 20-μm-diameter water jet after a laser-induced explosion, as recorded by Stan and co-workers5.

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Correspondence to Susan Davis Allen.

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Allen, S. How water explodes. Nature Phys 12, 899–900 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys3912

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