Articles | Volume 11, issue 9
https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-5315-2018
https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-5315-2018
Research article
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24 Sep 2018
Research article | Highlight paper |  | 24 Sep 2018

Cleaning up our water: reducing interferences from nonhomogeneous freezing of “pure” water in droplet freezing assays of ice-nucleating particles

Michael Polen, Thomas Brubaker, Joshua Somers, and Ryan C. Sullivan

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AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision
AR by Ryan Sullivan on behalf of the Authors (27 Aug 2018)  Author's response   Manuscript 
ED: Publish as is (29 Aug 2018) by Mingjin Tang
AR by Ryan Sullivan on behalf of the Authors (02 Sep 2018)
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Short summary
Ice nucleation commonly studied using droplet freezing measurements suffers from artifacts caused by water impurities or substrate effects. We evaluate a series of substrates and water sources to find methods that reduce the background freezing temperature limit. The best performance was obtained from our new microfluidic device and hydrophobic glass surfaces, using filtered HPLC bottled water. We conclude with recommendations for best practices in droplet freezing experiments and data analysis.