Does Hot Water Freeze Faster Than Cold? Physicists Keep Asking. - Quanta Magazine

Decades after a Tanzanian teenager initiated study of the “Mpemba effect,” the effort to confirm or refute it is leading physicists toward new theories about how substances relax to equilibrium.

Space was limited in the students refrigerator, and in the rush to nab the last available ice tray, Mpemba opted to skip waiting for his boiled-milk-and-sugar concoction to cool to room temperature l… [+4859 chars]

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