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The Essential Compound of Water on Earth

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Formed by two bonded hydrogens and an oxygen atom it is the second most essential compound to life on Earth, water. However, less than four percent of it is available for human consumption; it may be found in a liquid state or as water vapor within the atmosphere. As society progresses in becoming more populous and industrialized so does the demand for fresh water, thus scientists have and continue to experiment with adding particles to clouds in order to aid in creating precipitation. In nature, water continuously moves between the Earth and atmosphere through a process known as the hydrologic cycle. Evaporation and transportation cause water to rise, as warm air rises it becomes cooler and causes condensation, the droplets increase in size until the upward movement of air cannot support it (nucleation), and thus falls to the ground. It should be noted that warm air has the ability to hold more vapor than cold air and cloud formation occurs due to air becoming supersaturated. Conversely, nucleation does not always occur due to the cloud not being cold enough, we are then introduced to the process of cloud seeding (Lenschow).
The inorganic compound silver iodide (AgI) is sprayed or launched into the atmosphere as tiny particles that attract water molecules causing them to nucleate and fall to the ground as precipitation. Cloud seeding started it’s formation when Vincent Schaefer, a self-taught chemist in New York, attempted to get artificial clouds to produce

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