Mannitol Crystallization at Sub-Zero Temperatures: Time/Temperature-Resolved Synchrotron X-ray Diffraction Study and the Phase Diagram

Mannitol, a common pharmaceutical ingredient, exhibits complex polymorphism even in simple binary mannitol/water mixtures, with four crystalline forms observed. In this investigation, time/temperature-resolved synchrotron X-ray diffraction measurements are performed during freezing and thawing of mannitol/water mixtures. Mannitol crystallization depends strongly on the cooling rate and is initiated during cooling, if the cooling rate is lower than the critical cooling rate; otherwise, mannitol remains amorphous during freezing and crystallizes during subsequent heating above -30 °C. A temperature-composition phase diagram is constructed, reflecting eutectic and peritectic points and lower-temperature equilibria involving mannitol hemihydrate, hexagonal ice, and β-mannitol. Comparison of the experimental data with the phase diagram reveals that the mannitol crystallization behavior does not follow the equilibrium but appears to obey the Ostwald crystallization rule. Novel insights on equilibrium and kinetics phase relationships in mannitol/water systems could lead to improved formulations and manufacturing processes for pharmaceuticals and biopharmaceuticals.

Phase Behavior of Poloxamer 188 Aqueous Solutions at Subzero Temperatures: A Neutron and X-ray Scattering Study

Phase transitions of poloxamer 188 (P188) aqueous solutions at freezing temperatures are investigated using small-angle neutron scattering (SANS) and small- and wide-angle X-ray scatterings (SAXS and WAXS). It is shown that P188 solution (10%) undergoes the following sequence of phase transitions during cooling from 25 to -150 °C: micelle solution, solution of monomers, two-phase mixture of liquid crystalline mesophase + ice, and finally crystalline P188 + ice. Formation of the liquid crystalline phase during freezing is likely to be triggered by water freezing to ice and corresponding freeze concentration of the remaining solution. During heating of the frozen solutions, the sequence of the phase transitions is reversed: crystalline P188 + ice, liquid crystalline mesophase + ice, monomer solution + ice, monomer solution, and finally micelle solution. Similar phase transitions are detected for dilute solutions of P188 (1%) except that micelle formation is not observed at 25 °C, consistent with the literature reported critical micelle concentration (CMC) at this temperature. The present study provides new insight into P188 aqueous solutions at freezing temperatures and has practical implications on the design and development of pharmaceutical formulations.

Using Excimeric Fluorescence to Study How the Cooling Rate Determines the Behavior of Naphthalenes in Freeze-Concentrated Solutions: Vitrification and Crystallization

We utilized fluorescence spectroscopy to learn about the molecular arrangement of naphthalene (Np) and 1-methylnaphthalene (MeNp) in frozen aqueous solutions. The freezing induces pronounced compound aggregation in the freeze-concentrated solution (FCS) in between the ice grains. The fluorescence spectroscopy revealed prevalent formation of a vitrified solution and minor crystallization of aromatic compounds. The FCS is shown as a specific environment, differing significantly from not only the pure compounds but also the ice surfaces. The results indicate marked disparity between the behavior of the Np and the MeNp; the cooling rate has a major impact on the former but not on the latter. The spectrum of the Np solution frozen at a faster cooling rate (ca 20 K/min) exhibited a temperature-dependent spectral behavior, whereas the spectrum of the solution frozen at a slower rate (ca 2 K/min) did not alter before melting. We interpret the observation through considering the varied composition of the FCS: Fast freezing leads to a higher water content expressed by the plasticizing effect, allowing molecular rearrangement, while slow cooling produces a more concentrated and drier environment. The experiments were conceived as generalizable for environmentally relevant pollutants and human-made freezing.

What Determines the Ice Polymorph in Clouds?

Ice crystals in the atmosphere nucleate from supercooled liquid water and grow by vapor uptake. The structure of the ice polymorph grown has strong impact on the morphology and light scattering of the ice crystals, modulates the amount of water vapor in ice clouds, and can impact the molecular uptake and reactivity of atmospheric aerosols. Experiments and molecular simulations indicate that ice nucleated and grown from deeply supercooled liquid water is metastable stacking disordered ice. The ice polymorph grown from vapor has not yet been determined. Here we use large-scale molecular simulations to determine the structure of ice that grows as a result of uptake of water vapor in the temperature range relevant to cirrus and mixed-phase clouds, elucidate the molecular mechanism of the formation of ice at the vapor interface, and compute the free energy difference between cubic and hexagonal ice interfaces with vapor. We find that vapor deposition results in growth of stacking disordered ice only under conditions of extreme supersaturation, for which a nonequilibrium liquid layer completely wets the surface of ice. Such extreme conditions have been used to produce stacking disordered frost ice in experiments and may be plausible in the summer polar mesosphere. Growth of ice from vapor at moderate supersaturations in the temperature range relevant to cirrus and mixed-phase clouds, from 200 to 260 K, produces exclusively the stable hexagonal ice polymorph. Cubic ice is disfavored with respect to hexagonal ice not only by a small penalty in the bulk free energy (3.6 ± 1.5 J mol(-1) at 260 K) but also by a large free energy penalty at the ice-vapor interface (89.7 ± 12.8 J mol(-1) at 260 K). The latter originates in higher vibrational entropy of the hexagonal-terminated ice-vapor interface. We predict that the free energy penalty against the cubic ice interface should decrease strongly with temperature, resulting in some degree of stacking disorder in ice grown from vapor in the tropical tropopause layer, and in polar stratospheric and noctilucent clouds. Our findings support and explain the evolution of the morphology of ice crystals from hexagonal to trigonal symmetry with decreasing temperature, as reported by experiments and in situ measurements in clouds. We conclude that selective growth of the elusive cubic ice polymorph by manipulation of the interfacial properties can likely be achieved at the ice-liquid interface but not at the ice-vapor interface.

Ice Recrystallization in a Solution of a Cryoprotector and Its Inhibition by a Protein: Synchrotron X-Ray Diffraction Study

Ice formation and recrystallization is a key phenomenon in freezing and freeze-drying of pharmaceuticals and biopharmaceuticals. In this investigation, high-resolution synchrotron X-ray diffraction is used to quantify the extent of disorder of ice crystals in binary aqueous solutions of a cryoprotectant (sorbitol) and a protein, bovine serum albumin. Ice crystals in more dilute (10 wt%) solutions have lower level of microstrain and larger crystal domain size than these in more concentrated (40 wt%) solutions. Warming the sorbitol-water mixtures from 100 to 228 K resulted in partial ice melting, with simultaneous reduction in the microstrain and increase in crystallite size, that is, recrystallization. In contrast to sorbitol solutions, ice crystals in the BSA solutions preserved both the microstrain and smaller crystallite size on partial melting, demonstrating that BSA inhibits ice recrystallization. The results are consistent with BSA partitioning into quasi-liquid layer on ice crystals but not with a direct protein-ice interaction and protein sorption on ice surface. The study shows for the first time that a common (i.e., not-antifreeze) protein can have a major impact on ice recrystallization and also presents synchrotron X-ray diffraction as a unique tool for quantification of crystallinity and disorder in frozen aqueous systems.

Free energy contributions and structural characterization of stacking disordered ices

Crystallization of ice from deeply supercooled water and amorphous ices - a process of fundamental importance in the atmosphere, interstellar space, and cryobiology - results in stacking disordered ices with a wide range of metastabilities with respect to hexagonal ice. The structural origin of this high variability, however, has not yet been elucidated. Here we use molecular dynamics simulations with the mW water model to characterize the structure of ice freshly grown from supercooled water at temperatures from 210 to 270 K, the thermodynamics of stacking faults, line defects, and interfaces, and to elucidate the interplay between kinetics and thermodynamics in determining the structure of ice. In agreement with experiments, the ice grown in the simulations is stacking disordered with a random distribution of cubic and hexagonal layers, and a cubicity that decreases with growth temperature. The former implies that the cubicity of ice is determined by processes at the ice/liquid interface, without memory of the structure of buried ice layers. The latter indicates that the probability of building a cubic layer at the interface decreases upon approaching the melting point of ice, which we attribute to a more efficient structural equilibration of ice at the liquid interface as the driving force for growth wanes. The free energy cost for creating a pair of cubic layers in ice is 8.0 J mol(-1) in experiments, and 9.7 ± 1.9 J mol(-1) for the mW water model. This not only validates the simulations, but also indicates that dispersion in cubicity is not sufficient to explain the large energetic variability of stacking disordered ices. We compute the free energy cost of stacking disorder, line defects, and interfaces in ice and conclude that a characterization of the density of these defects is required to predict the degree of metastability and vapor pressure of atmospheric ices.

Stacking disorder in ice I

Traditionally, ice I was considered to exist in two well-defined crystalline forms at ambient pressure: stable hexagonal ice (ice Ih) and metastable cubic ice (ice Ic). However, it is becoming increasingly evident that what has been called cubic ice in the past does not have a structure consistent with the cubic crystal system. Instead, it is a stacking-disordered material containing cubic sequences interlaced with hexagonal sequences, which is termed stacking-disordered ice (ice Isd). In this article, we summarise previous work on ice with stacking disorder including ice that was called cubic ice in the past. We also present new experimental data which shows that ice which crystallises after heterogeneous nucleation in water droplets containing solid inclusions also contains stacking disorder even at freezing temperatures of around -15 °C. This supports the results from molecular simulations, that the structure of ice that crystallises initially from supercooled water is always stacking-disordered and that this metastable ice can transform to the stable hexagonal phase subject to the kinetics of recrystallization. We also show that stacking disorder in ice which forms from water droplets is quantitatively distinct from ice made via other routes. The emerging picture of ice I is that of a very complex material which frequently contains stacking disorder and this stacking disorder can vary in complexity depending on the route of formation and thermal history.

An assessment of vapour pressure estimation methods

Laboratory measurements of vapour pressures for atmospherically relevant compounds were collated and used to assess the accuracy of vapour pressure estimates generated by seven estimation methods and impacts on predicted secondary organic aerosol. Of the vapour pressure estimation methods that were applicable to all the test set compounds, the Lee-Kesler [Reid et al., The Properties of Gases and Liquids, 1987] method showed the lowest mean absolute error and the Nannoolal et al. [Nannoonal et al., Fluid Phase Equilib., 2008, 269, 117-133] method showed the lowest mean bias error (when both used normal boiling points estimated using the Nannoolal et al. [Nannoolal et al., Fluid Phase Equilib., 2004, 226, 45-63] method). The effect of varying vapour pressure estimation methods on secondary organic aerosol (SOA) mass loading and composition was investigated using an absorptive partitioning equilibrium model. The Myrdal and Yalkowsky [Myrdal and Yalkowsky, Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., 1997, 36, 2494-2499] vapour pressure estimation method using the Nannoolal et al. [Nannoolal et al., Fluid Phase Equilib., 2004, 226, 45-63] normal boiling point gave the most accurate estimation of SOA loading despite not being the most accurate for vapour pressures alone.

Extent and relevance of stacking disorder in "ice I(c)"

A solid water phase commonly known as "cubic ice" or "ice I(c)" is frequently encountered in various transitions between the solid, liquid, and gaseous phases of the water substance. It may form, e.g., by water freezing or vapor deposition in the Earth's atmosphere or in extraterrestrial environments, and plays a central role in various cryopreservation techniques; its formation is observed over a wide temperature range from about 120 K up to the melting point of ice. There was multiple and compelling evidence in the past that this phase is not truly cubic but composed of disordered cubic and hexagonal stacking sequences. The complexity of the stacking disorder, however, appears to have been largely overlooked in most of the literature. By analyzing neutron diffraction data with our stacking-disorder model, we show that correlations between next-nearest layers are clearly developed, leading to marked deviations from a simple random stacking in almost all investigated cases. We follow the evolution of the stacking disorder as a function of time and temperature at conditions relevant to atmospheric processes; a continuous transformation toward normal hexagonal ice is observed. We establish a quantitative link between the crystallite size established by diffraction and electron microscopic images of the material; the crystallite size evolves from several nanometers into the micrometer range with progressive annealing. The crystallites are isometric with markedly rough surfaces parallel to the stacking direction, which has implications for atmospheric sciences.

Comparing the mechanism of water condensation and evaporation in glassy aerosol

Atmospheric models generally assume that aerosol particles are in equilibrium with the surrounding gas phase. However, recent observations that secondary organic aerosols can exist in a glassy state have highlighted the need to more fully understand the kinetic limitations that may control water partitioning in ambient particles. Here, we explore the influence of slow water diffusion in the condensed aerosol phase on the rates of both condensation and evaporation, demonstrating that significant inhibition in mass transfer occurs for ultraviscous aerosol, not just for glassy aerosol. Using coarse mode (3-4 um radius) ternary sucrose/sodium chloride/aqueous droplets as a proxy for multicomponent ambient aerosol, we demonstrate that the timescale for particle equilibration correlates with bulk viscosity and can be ≫10(3) s. Extrapolation of these timescales to particle sizes in the accumulation mode (e.g., approximately 100 nm) by applying the Stokes-Einstein equation suggests that the kinetic limitations imposed on mass transfer of water by slow bulk phase diffusion must be more fully investigated for atmospheric aerosol. Measurements have been made on particles covering a range in dynamic viscosity from < 0.1 to > 10(13) Pa s. We also retrieve the radial inhomogeneities apparent in particle composition during condensation and evaporation and contrast the dynamics of slow dissolution of a viscous core into a labile shell during condensation with the slow percolation of water during evaporation through a more homogeneous viscous particle bulk.

Structure of ice crystallized from supercooled water

The freezing of water to ice is fundamentally important to fields as diverse as cloud formation to cryopreservation. At ambient conditions, ice is considered to exist in two crystalline forms: stable hexagonal ice and metastable cubic ice. Using X-ray diffraction data and Monte Carlo simulations, we show that ice that crystallizes homogeneously from supercooled water is neither of these phases. The resulting ice is disordered in one dimension and therefore possesses neither cubic nor hexagonal symmetry and is instead composed of randomly stacked layers of cubic and hexagonal sequences. We refer to this ice as stacking-disordered ice I. Stacking disorder and stacking faults have been reported earlier for metastable ice I, but only for ice crystallizing in mesopores and in samples recrystallized from high-pressure ice phases rather than in water droplets. Review of the literature reveals that almost all ice that has been identified as cubic ice in previous diffraction studies and generated in a variety of ways was most likely stacking-disordered ice I with varying degrees of stacking disorder. These findings highlight the need to reevaluate the physical and thermodynamic properties of this metastable ice as a function of the nature and extent of stacking disorder using well-characterized samples.

Freezing injury: the special case of the sperm cell

The cellular damage that spermatozoa encounter at rapid rates of cooling has often been attributed to the formation of intracellular ice although no convincing evidence of intracellular ice formation has ever been obtained. We demonstrate that the high intracellular protein content together with the osmotic shrinkage associated with extracellular ice formation leads to intracellular vitrification of spermatozoa during cooling. At rapid rates of cooling the cell damage to spermatozoa is a result of an osmotic imbalance encountered during thawing, not intracellular ice formation. The osmotic imbalance occurs at rapid cooling rates due to a diffusion limited ice crystallisation in the extracellular fluid, i.e. the amount of ice forming during the cooling is less than expected from the equilibrium phase diagram. This explanation allows insights into other aspects of the cryobiology of spermatozoa and it is anticipated that this understanding will lead to specific improved methods of conventional cryopreservation for mammalian spermatozoa. It is also likely that this model will be relevant to the development of novel technologies for sperm preservation including vitrification and freeze drying.

Single freezing and triple melting of micrometre-scaled (NH4)2SO4/H2O droplets

Atmospheric aerosol droplets containing NH(4)(+) and SO(4)(2-) ions are precursors of cirrus ice clouds. However, the low-temperature phase transformation of such droplets is not understood yet. Here we show for the first time that micrometre-scaled (NH(4))(2)SO(4)/H(2)O droplets produce one freezing event but three melting events which are the melting of (i) pure ice, (ii) eutectic ice/(NH(4))(2)SO(4), and (iii) eutectic ice/(NH(4))(3)H(SO(4))(2). We also find that the melting of ice/(NH(4))(3)H(SO(4))(2) consists of two eutectic melting events, presumably ice/letovicite-II and ice/letovicite-III.

Different freezing behavior of millimeter- and micrometer-scaled (NH₄)₂SO₄/H₂O droplets

Although the freezing of aqueous solutions is important for nature and different branches of science and freeze-applications, our understanding of the freezing process is not complete. For example, numerous measurements of micrometer-scaled (NH(4))(2)SO(4)/H(2)O droplets report one freezing event below the eutectic point. However, measurements of larger millimeter-scaled droplets reveal two freezing events: the freezing out of ice and subsequent freezing of a residual freeze-concentrated solution. To resolve this apparent contradiction we performed numerous calorimetric measurements which indicate that the freezing of a residual solution of millimeter-scaled 5-38 wt% (NH(4))(2)SO(4) droplets occurs mainly between ∼ 210 and 225 K. We also find that micrometer-scaled droplets produce one freezing event which is within or in the vicinity of the ∼ 210-225 K region. This fact and the analysis of thermograms suggest that the residual solution of micrometer-scaled droplets may partly crystallize simultaneously with ice and partly transform to glass at T(g)≈172 K. Our results suggest for the first time that the size of (NH(4))(2)SO(4)/H(2)O droplets may affect the number of freezing events below the eutectic point.