Water is so familiar we barely notice it, and yet almost everything about it is scientifically peculiar — it breaks the rules that other liquids obey, and life depends utterly on those broken rules. This episode reveals why the most common substance on Earth’s surface is also one of the strangest.

You’ll come away understanding what makes a water molecule special, why ice floats when nearly every other solid sinks, why water can climb up a tree, and why these oddities made life on Earth possible.

Talking Science is sponsored by Kinsoft. Visit www.kinsoft.com.au

Further reading: Royal Society of Chemistry – “Water”; Philip Ball, H2O: A Biography of Water; USGS Water Science School.