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A comment on These Are the Highest-Resolution Photos Ever Taken of Snowflakes. Parent comment

Re:These Are the Highest-Resolution Photos Ever Taken of Sno... by hermitcrab on Saturday December 30, 2023 @03:03PM (#38818537)
I don't understand how they are even close to symmetric. The 'seed' seems unlikely to be symmetric. There is no way for one 'arm' to communicate directly with another. And the conditions (temperature etc) is unlikely to be completely uniform around that seed.
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Re:These Are the Highest-Resolution Photos Ever Taken of Sno... by neurostimulant on Saturday December 30, 2023 @03:47PM (#38818943)
> The ice crystals that make up snowflakes are symmetrical (or patterned) because they reflect the internal order of the crystal’s water molecules as they arrange themselves in predetermined spaces (known as “crystallization”) to form a six-sided snowflake.

https://www.noaa.gov/stories/how-do-snowflakes-form-science-...

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Re:These Are the Highest-Resolution Photos Ever Taken of Sno... by hermitcrab on Saturday December 30, 2023 @04:30PM (#38819379)
>Because each arm experiences the same atmospheric conditions, the arms look identical.

Thanks. But I'm still not convinced. If it is just that the microclimate around the seed is the same, why aren't adjacent crystals identical?

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Re:These Are the Highest-Resolution Photos Ever Taken of Sno... by clintfred on Saturday December 30, 2023 @05:39PM (#38820002)
Maybe they are? Has this been tested?
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