Condensation is the change in matter of a substance to a denser phase, such as a gas (or vapor) to a liquid.^[1] Condensation commonly occurs when a vapor is cooled to a liquid, but can also occur if a vapor is compressed (i.e., pressure on it increased) into a liquid, or undergoes a combination of cooling and compression. Liquid which has been condensed from a vapor is called condensate. A device or unit used to condense vapors into liquid is called a condenser. Condensers are used in heat exchangers which have various designs, and come in many sizes ranging from rather small (hand-held) to very large.

The water seen on the outside of a cold glass on a hot day is an example of condensation.

Condensation of water in nature

Water vapor from air which naturally condenses on cold surfaces into liquid water is called dew. Water vapor will only condense onto another surface when that surface is cooler than the temperature of the water vapor, or when the water vapor equilibrium in air, i. e. saturation humidity, has been exceeded. When water vapor condenses onto a surface, a net warming occurs on that surface. The water molecule brings a parcel of heat with it. In turn, the temperature of the atmosphere drops very slightly.

In the atmosphere, condensation of water vapor is what produces clouds. The dew point of an air parcel is the temperature to which it must cool before condensation in the air begins to form.

Also, a net condensation of water vapor occurs on surfaces when the temperature of the surface is at or below the dew point temperature of the atmosphere. Deposition is a type of condensation. Deposition, the direct formation of ice from water vapor, is a type of condensation. Frost and snow are examples of deposition.

Condensation in buildings

Condensation is the most common form of dampness encountered in buildings. In buildings the internal air can have a high level of relative humidity due to the activity of the occupants (e.g. cooking, drying clothes, breathing etc...). When this air comes into contact with cold surfaces such as windows and cold walls it can condense, causing dampness.^[2] the change from water vapor to liquid water (dew,fog,clouds)

Applications of condensation

Condensation is a crucial component of distillation, an important application in laboratory and industrial chemistry application.

Because condensation is a naturally occurring phenomenon, it can often be used to generate water in large quantities for human use. In fact, there are many structures that are made solely for the purpose of collecting water from condensation, such as fog fences, air wells and dew ponds. Such systems can often be used to retain soil moisture in areas where active desertification is occurring. In fact, certain organizations use education about water condensers in efforts to effectively aid such areas.^[3]

References

• Condensation principles (Picture).
• Condensation & Evaporation Experiment (Video).

See also

• Kelvin equation
• Phase diagram
• Phase transition

External links

• Condensation Myths and Facts

From	To
	Solid	Liquid	Gas	Plasma
Solid	Solid-Solid Transformation	Melting	Sublimation	-
Liquid	Freezing	N/A	Boiling/Evaporation	-
Gas	Deposition	Condensation	N/A	Ionization
Plasma	-	-	Recombination/Deionization	N/A

Gas is one of the four major states of matter, consisting of freely moving atoms or molecules without a definite shape. Compared to the solid and liquid states of matter a gas has lower density and a lower viscosity.
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Liquid is one of the four principal states of matter. A liquid is a fluid that can freely form a distinct surface at the boundaries of its bulk material.

Characteristics

A liquid's shape is determined by, not confined to, the container it fills.
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Pressure (symbol: p) is the force per unit area applied on a surface in a direction perpendicular to that surface.

Gauge pressure is the pressure relative to the local atmospheric or ambient pressure.
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Condenser may refer to:

• Condenser (laboratory), a range of laboratory glassware used to remove heat from fluids.
• Abbe condenser, a group of lenses mounted below the stage of an optical microscope to concentrate light.

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A heat exchanger is a device built for efficient heat transfer from one fluid or gas to another, whether the fluids are separated by a solid wall so that they never mix, or the fluids are directly contacted.
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Dew is water in the form of droplets that appears on thin, exposed objects in the morning or evening. As the exposed surface cools by radiating its heat, atmospheric moisture condenses at a rate greater than that of which it can evaporate, resulting in the formation of
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trillion fold).]]

Temperature is a physical property of a system that underlies the common notions of hot and cold; something that is hotter generally has the greater temperature. Temperature is one of the principal parameters of thermodynamics.
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Humidity is the amount of water vapor in a sample of air compared to the maximum amount of water vapor the air can hold at any specific temperature. Absolute humidity, relative humidity and specific humidity are different ways to express the water content in a parcel of air.
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In thermochemistry, latent heat is the amount of energy in the form of heat released or absorbed by a substance during a change of phase (i.e. solid, liquid, or gas), - also called a phase transition.
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atmosphere is a layer of gases that may surround a material body of sufficient mass.^[1] The gases are attracted by the gravity of the body, and are retained for a longer duration if gravity is high and the atmosphere's temperature is low.
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Earth's atmosphere is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth and retained by the Earth's gravity. It contains roughly (by molar content/volume) 78% nitrogen, 20.95% oxygen, 0.93% argon, 0.
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cloud is a visible mass of condensed droplets, frozen crystals suspended in the atmosphere above the surface of the Earth or another planetary body, such as a moon. (Clouds can also occur as masses of material in interstellar space, where they are called interstellar clouds and
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The dew point (or dewpoint) is the temperature to which a given parcel of air must be cooled, at constant barometric pressure, for water vapor to condense into water. The condensed water is called dew. The dew point is a saturation point.
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Deposition is a process in which gas transforms into solid (also known as desublimation). The reverse of deposition is sublimation.

One example of deposition is the process by which, in sub-freezing air, water vapor changes directly to ice without first becoming a liquid.
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SNOW 1.0 and 2.0 are two word-based synchronous stream ciphers developed by Thomas Johansson and Patrik Ekdahl at Lund University.

SNOW 1.0, originally simply SNOW, was submitted to the NESSIE project.
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Distillation is a method of separating chemical substances based on differences in their volatilities in a boiling liquid mixture. Distillation usually forms part of a larger chemical process, and is thus referred to as a unit operation.
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A fog fence is an apparatus for collecting liquid water from fog, consisting of a fine mesh deployed in a manner similar to a fence. It has the advantage of being passive, requiring no external energy source to perform its collection.
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Dew pond is an artificial pond sited on the top of a hill, intended for watering livestock. Dew ponds are used in areas where a natural supply of surface water may not be readily available.
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Desertification is the degradation of land in arid, semi arid and dry sub-humid areas resulting from various climatic variations, but primarily from human activities. Current desertification is taking place much faster worldwide than historically and usually arises from the
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The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) (IPA: [aɪ ju pæk]) is an international non-governmental organization established in 1919 devoted to the advancement of chemistry.
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Compendium of Chemical Terminology (ISBN 0-86542-684-8) is a book published by IUPAC containing internationally accepted definitions for terms in chemistry. Work on the first edition was initiated by Victor Gold, hence its informal name, the Gold Book.
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Kelvin equation describes the change of vapour pressure over liquid curved with a radius r (for example, in a capillary or over a droplet). The Kelvin equation is used for determination of pore size distribution of a porous medium using adsorption porosimetry.
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In physical chemistry, mineralogy, and materials science, a phase diagram is a type of graph used to show the equilibrium conditions between the thermodynamically-distinct phases.
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phase transition or phase change is the transformation of a thermodynamic system from one phase to another. The distinguishing characteristic of a phase transition is an abrupt change in one or more physical properties, in particular the heat capacity, with a small change in
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A solid object is in the states of matter characterized by resistance to deformation and changes of volume. At the microscopic scale, a solid has these properties :

• The atoms or molecules that comprise the solid are packed closely together.

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Liquid is one of the four principal states of matter. A liquid is a fluid that can freely form a distinct surface at the boundaries of its bulk material.

Characteristics

A liquid's shape is determined by, not confined to, the container it fills.
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Gas is one of the four major states of matter, consisting of freely moving atoms or molecules without a definite shape. Compared to the solid and liquid states of matter a gas has lower density and a lower viscosity.
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plasma is typically an ionized gas. Plasma is considered to be a distinct state of matter, apart from gases, because of its unique properties. "Ionized" refers to presence of one or more free electrons, which are not bound to an atom or molecule.
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Melting is a process that results in the phase change of a substance from a solid to a liquid. The internal energy of a solid substance is increased (typically by the application of heat) to a specific temperature (called the melting point) at which it changes to the liquid phase.
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Sublimation of an element or compound is a transition from the solid to gas phase with no intermediate liquid stage. Sublimation is a phase transition that occurs at temperatures and pressures below the triple point (see phase diagram).
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