Journey

(2/n) Focusing on the border of the drop (yellow arrow) reveals tiny particles of different sizes and light refraction properties:

(3/n) Zooming in, the larger particles were found to have a diameter of about 1 µm.

For comparison:

• Diameter of a human hair: 70-90 µm ⁽⁰¹⁾ https://link.springer.com/article/10.1684/ejd.2015.2726
• Human red blood cell: 8 µm ⁽⁰²⁾ https://sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022509603001595
• SARS-CoV-2: 90-100 nm ⁽⁰³⁾ https://nature.com/articles/s41598-021-82852-7

(4/n) The smaller particles are about 0.5 µm (= 500 nm) in diameter:

(5/n) Some particle aggregations were also visible in the liquid:

(6/n) Fiber-like structures can also be seen. Their diameter is in the nm-range. (Remember, a human hair has a diameter of about 70-90 µm). Some of them look like a continuous fiber (a, c), some have branches (b, d).

(6/n) Fiber-like structures can also be seen. Their diameter is in the nm-range. (Remember, a human hair has a diameter of about 70-90 µm). Some of them look like a continuous fiber (a, c), some have branches (b, d).

(7/n) More fiber-like structures. A ring-like structure was seen once (d).

(7/n) More fiber-like structures. A ring-like structure was seen once (d).

(8/n) A further class of particles: comparatively large and with unique light refraction properties. They come in different shapes (e.g rod-like, squares):

(8/n) A futher class of particles: comparatively large and with unique light refraction properties. They come in different shapes (e.g rod-like, squares):

(9/n) More of these objects:

(9/n) More of these objects:

(10/n11/n) A few unusually shaped objects were found, e.g. a 45 µm long ribbed structure (b) and a particle of about 10 µm in diameter with some “spikes” attached (d).

(12/n) Parts of the liquid crystallized after about 15 min. Encapsulated areas can be seen with crystallized objects of different sizes inside. It’s almost beautiful.

(13/n) Sometimes, these encapsulated crystallized areas (white arrow) contained objects with different light refraction properties to the particles surrounding them (yellow arrow):

(14/n) Oval-shaped encapsulated crystallized structures can be seen:

(15/n) These oval-shaped encapsulated crystallized structures have complex internal sub-structures with compartmentalization and particles of different sizes:

(16/n) One oval-shaped encapsulated crystallized structure was found attached to a fiber-like object (yellow arrow) with a diameter of about 10 µm: