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Maximum density

Highest attainable density of a substance under given conditions

Wikipedia contributorsAdapted for Fathomly · View authors
1 min read
Source updated November 25, 2023

The maximum density of a substance is the highest attainable density of the substance under given conditions.

01Attaining maximum density

Almost all known substances undergo thermal expansion in response to heating, meaning that a given mass of substance contracts to a low volume at low temperatures, when little thermal energy is present. Substances, especially fluids in which intermolecular forces are weak, also undergo compression upon the application of pressure. Nearly all substances therefore reach a density maximum at very low temperatures and very high pressures, characteristic properties of the solid state of matter.

02Water

An especially notable irregular maximum density is that of water, which reaches a density peak at 4 °C (39 °F). This has important ramifications in Earth's ecosystem.

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Sources and credits

This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Maximum density”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.

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Related topics

List of chemical elements

118 chemical elements have been identified and named officially by IUPAC. A chemical element, often simply called an element, is a type of atom which has a specific number of protons in its atomic nucleus. The definitive visualisation of all 118 elements is the periodic table of the elements, whose history along the principles of the periodic law was one of the founding developments of modern chemistry.

Density

Density is the ratio of a substance's mass to its volume. The symbol most often used for density is ρ (the lower case Greek letter rho), although the Latin letter D (or d) can also be used: ρ = m V , {\displaystyle \rho ={\frac {m}{V}},} where ρ is the density, m is the mass, and V is the volume.

Relative density

Relative density, also called specific gravity, is a dimensionless quantity defined as the ratio of the density of a substance to the density of a given reference material. The relative density of solids and liquids is nearly always measured with respect to water at its densest (at 4 °C or 39.2 °F); for gases, the reference is air at room temperature (25 °C or 77.0 °F).