When you step onto an icy sidewalk or push off on skis, the surface can seem to vanish beneath you. For more than a century, scientists have debated why ice stays slippery, even well below freezing.

It’s an oft-cited science “fact” that ice is slippery due to pressure or friction, but this explanation doesn’t explain why ice’s slippery behavior remains at temperatures where such melting isn’t ...

Winter Storm Fern, a rare convergence of Arctic cold and Southwest moisture, seems set to bring Arctic weather to many parts of the U.S. this weekend. With it, storm warnings included familiar ...

The reason we can gracefully glide on an ice-skating rink or clumsily slip on an icy sidewalk is that the surface of ice is coated by a thin watery layer. Scientists generally agree that this ...