Regelation, Surface Diffusion, and Ice Sintering

Abstract

The freezing together of ice particles when they are brought into contact, originally described by Faraday and called regelation, is shown to occur not only at the freezing point, but also at temperatures as low as −25°C. It is shown that pressure melting is not essential to the process, nor is the presence of any unique liquid film. The welding together of ice particles occurs as a result of surface diffusion, as indicated by the time dependence and particle size dependence for the process. Surface diffusion of H2O molecules over an ice surface is found to be rapid. Equations for the kinetics of the process are closely related to those derived for sintering phenomena, but a quantitative derivation of the surface diffusion coefficient is not obtained.