The melting point of a solid is the temperature at which it changes state from solid to liquid. At the melting point the solid and liquid phase exist in equilibrium. The melting point of a substance depends (usually slightly) on pressure and is usually specified at standard pressure. When considered as the temperature of the reverse change from liquid to solid, it is referred to as the freezing point or crystallization point. Because of the ability of some substances to supercool, the freezing point is not considered as a characteristic property of a substance. When the "characteristic freezing point" of a substance is determined, in fact the actual methodology is almost always "the principle of observing the disappearance rather than the formation of ice", that is, the melting point.
Read more about Melting Point: Examples, Melting Point Measurements, Thermodynamics, Freezing-point Depression, Carnelley’s Rule, Predicting The Melting Point of Substances (Lindemann's Criterion), Open Melting Point Data
Famous quotes containing the words melting and/or point:
“Of course Im a black writer.... Im not just a black writer, but categories like black writer, woman writer and Latin American writer arent marginal anymore. We have to acknowledge that the thing we call literature is more pluralistic now, just as society ought to be. The melting pot never worked. We ought to be able to accept on equal terms everybody from the Hassidim to Walter Lippmann, from the Rastafarians to Ralph Bunche.”
—Toni Morrison (b. 1931)
“We fancy men are individuals; so are pumpkins; but every pumpkin in the field, goes through every point of pumpkin history.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)