Growing Snow in Pasadena

For a city so proud of its mild, sunny winters that it created the Rose Parade to tout its climate, Pasadena—or, at least, Caltech—has become, somewhat paradoxically, renowned for its snowflakes.

Every year, when flurries begin falling across the country, members of the media begin flocking to speak with Caltech physicist and snowflake guru Ken Libbrecht, who literally wrote the book—or, rather, books—on the science and beauty of the frozen crystals. In his lab, he creates countless snowflakes to investigate and explain how subtle changes in temperature, pressure, and humidity give rise to an impressively varied menagerie of intricate snowflake forms.

In recent years, we have showcased his research in articles that explain the physics of snowflake formation in clouds and even how to grow your own snowflakes at home. This year, we are pleased to share some of his most recent micrographs documenting the fascinating and beautiful results of his investigations.

This slideshow features some of Libbrecht’s images that show representative samples of some common types of snowflakes: needles, stellar dendrites, stellar plates, columns, sectored plates, capped columns, and bullet rosettes.

To learn more, visit Libbrecht’s comprehensive site. It features sections on the science, aesthetics, and history of snowflakes—and it also answers the age-old question of whether any two snowflakes are alike. (Spoiler alert: they aren’t.)