FREE! Click here to Join FunTrivia. Thousands of games, quizzes, and lots more!
Fun Trivia
Home: Questions and Answers Forum
Answers to 100,000 Fascinating Questions
Welcome to FunTrivia's Question & Answer forum!

Search All Questions


Please cite any factual claims with citation links or references from authoritative sources. Editors continuously recheck submissions and claims.

Archived Questions

Goto Qn #


What is the coldest substance?

Question #98140. Asked by storky1.
Last updated May 13 2021.

avatar
darthrevan89
Answer has 13 votes
darthrevan89
17 year member
120 replies avatar

Answer has 13 votes.
Liquid air. It is the coldest substance known. It takes an intense cold to produce it, and it has to remain cold much as ice is cold, only very much more so, as long as it is liquid air.

birdnature.com/jan1900/air.html no longer exists


Response last updated by gtho4 on May 13 2021.
Jul 31 2008, 9:34 AM
avatar
zbeckabee star
Answer has 23 votes
Currently Best Answer
zbeckabee star
Moderator
18 year member
11752 replies avatar

Answer has 23 votes.

Currently voted the best answer.
Liquid hydrogen is the coldest substance known to man, minus 400 degrees.

link http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0607/03/ltm.08.html

ALSO: A Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) is a state of matter of bosons confined in an external potential and cooled to temperatures very near to absolute zero (0 K, ?273.15 °C, or ?459 °F ). Under such supercooled conditions, a large fraction of the atoms collapse into the lowest quantum state of the external potential, at which point quantum effects become apparent on a macroscopic scale.

link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bose%E2%80%93Einstein_condensate


Response last updated by gtho4 on May 13 2021.
Jul 31 2008, 11:24 AM
avatar
Baloo55th star
Answer has 6 votes
Baloo55th star
21 year member
4545 replies avatar

Answer has 6 votes.
Hydrogen liquifies at −252.87°C (−423.17 °F for non-scientific places...) However, the Boomerang Nebula is recorded at −272.15 °C and that's even colder than the universal background radiation. link http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap071228.html for a nice filter coloured pic.
In theory, any substance can be cooled to near absolute zero if you try hard enough. Also, absolute zero can't be reached, but they seem to have got down to 700 billionths of a degree kelvin (the nebula I referred to is at 1°K). Thus, there is no single substance that is the coldest. The record holder is whatever they worked on at the time. Hydrogen just happens to have one of the lowest temperatures at which a transition occurs (i.e. gas to liquid). Most other things are solid by then, but that doesn't stop them being capable of temperature reduction. link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_zero
Don't be fooled by negative temperatures. Absolute zero is 0°K, and that is regarded as the end of the line. (That's why it's 0 degrees K. The other scales zero at much higher temperatures. Think of it like bank accounts - F and C are current accounts where you can have an overdraft. K is a savings account where you cannot go below a zero balance.) There are so-called negative temperatures involving K. This is a scientific trick of the trade (like the square root of -1 in maths) and doesn't mean below absolute zero. link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_temperature for what it does mean.

Jul 31 2008, 1:18 PM
queproblema
Answer has 10 votes
queproblema
18 year member
2119 replies

Answer has 10 votes.
The coldest substance on earth seems to be liquid or solid helium--they have trouble telling them apart, apparently.

"Unlike any other element, helium will remain liquid down to absolute zero at normal pressures. This is a direct effect of quantum mechanics: specifically, the zero point energy of the system is too high to allow freezing. Solid helium requires a temperature of 1–1.5 K (about −272 °C or −457 °F) and about 25 bar (2.5 MPa) of pressure. It is often hard to distinguish solid from liquid helium since the refractive index of the two phases are nearly the same."
link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium#Solid_and_liquid_phases

Can't say I understand much of that; I'm just looking at the numbers. And, yes, I noticed Storky's not limiting it to Earth, but he is limiting it to a [single] substance.

Jul 31 2008, 1:27 PM
free email trivia FREE! Get a new mixed Fun Trivia quiz each day in your email. It's a fun way to start your day!


arrow Your Email Address:

Sign in or Create Free User ID to participate in the discussion

Related FunTrivia Quizzes

play quiz Coldest Places on Earth
(Physical Geography Extremes)
play quiz A Woman of Substance
(Womens History)
play quiz 3.17 "Lyle & Substance"
('Las Vegas'- Season 3)

Return to FunTrivia
"Ask FunTrivia" strives to offer the best answers possible to trivia questions. We ask our submitters to thoroughly research questions and provide sources where possible. Feel free to post corrections or additions. This is server B184.