Ice growth in supercooled solutions of a biological “antifreeze”, AFGP 1–5: an explanation in terms of adsorption rate for the concentration dependence of the freezing point

It is widely accepted, and we agree, that the lowering of the temperature at which ice can grow in a water solution of one of the biological antifreezes is a result of adsorption of the antifreeze molecules at the ice surface. However, how this can produce a well-defined “freezing point” that varies with the solution concentration has remained problematical. The results of a series of measurements of ice growing in supercooled solutions of an effective antifreeze are reported and interpreted in terms of this fundamental problem. It seemed that the solution of the problem would have to rely upon adsorption rate, because that appeared to be the only way for the concentration in solution to be so important. The crystal growth results are most unusual, and appear to confirm this. The growth rates over a wide range of antifreeze concentration in solution (about 0.05 to 9 mg ml⁻¹) are zero from the thermodynamic freezing point down to the “non-equilibrium” freezing point, where there is a very sudden increase to a plateau value that then remains about constant as the supercooling is increased by about 2 °C. The plateau values of growth rate are faster than those from pure water at the lower-supercooling ends of the plateaus, but slower at higher supercooling, until the growth rate starts rising toward that from pure water. These plateau values of growth rate increase markedly with increasing concentration of the antifreeze in solution. Along with these changes there are complex changes in the growth orientations, from c-axis spicules in the plateaus to those more characteristic of growth from pure water at greater supercooling. We conclude that the non-equilibrium freezing point is determined by the adsorption rate. It is the warmest temperature at which the ice growth rate on the basal plane (where the antifreeze does not adsorb) is fast enough to prevent the area of basal face on a growing ice crystal from becoming too small to grow, which is determined in turn by the adsorption rate on non-basal surfaces, which is proportional to the solution concentration. This mechanism answers the question of how the antifreeze stops growth rather than how it prevents growth, a subtle but important difference.