Purely Inorganic Highly Efficient Ice Nucleating Particle

[Image: see text] To evaluate the role of atmospheric heterogeneous reactions on the ice nucleation ability of airborne dust particles, we investigated the systematic study of ice nucleation microphysics with a suite of atmospherically relevant metals (10), halides (4), and oxyhalides (2). Within a minute, a kaolin–iron oxide composite (KaFe) showed efficient reactions with aqueous mercury salts. Among the different mercury salts tested, only HgCl(2) reacting with KaFe generated HgKaFe, a highly efficient ice nucleating particle (HEIN). When added to water, HgKaFe caused water to freeze at much warmer temperatures, within a narrow range of −6.6 to −4.7 °C. Using a suite of optical spectroscopy, mass spectrometry, and microscopy techniques, we performed various experiments to decipher the physical and chemical properties of surface and bulk. KaFe was identified as a mixture of different iron oxides, namely, goethite, hematite, magnetite, and ε-Fe(2)O(3), with kaolin. In HgKaFe, HgCl(2) was reduced to Hg(2)Cl(2) and iron was predominantly in maghemite form. Reduction of Fe(2+) by NaBH(4), followed by aerial oxidation, helped KaFe to be an exact precursor for the synthesis of HEIN HgKaFe. Kaolin served as a template for synthesizing iron oxide, opposing unwanted aggregation. No other metal or metal halide was found to have more efficient nucleating particles than HgCl(2) with KaFe composite. The chelation of Hg(II) hindered the formation of HEIN. This study is useful for investigating the role of morphology and how inorganic chemical reactions on the surface of dust change morphology and thus ice nucleation activity. The understanding of the fundamentals of what makes a particle to be a good ice nucleating particle is valuable to further understand and predict the amount and types of atmospheric ice nucleating particles.