Spontaneous liquid-liquid phase separation of water.

We report a molecular dynamics simulation demonstrating a fast spontaneous liquid-liquid phase separation of water and a subsequent slow crystallization to ice. It is found that supercooled water separates rapidly into low- and high-density domains so as to reduce the surface energy in the rectangular simulation cell at certain thermodynamic states. The liquid-liquid phase separation, which is about two orders of magnitude faster than the crystallization, suggests a possibility to observe this phenomenon experimentally.