THE mantra is familiar to countless generations of schoolchildren: oil and water do not mix. You have to shake them to overcome the forces that hold the oil together.
Now teachers may want to rewrite their lessons. If you first remove any gas that is dissolved in the water, it will mix spontaneously and even stay that way indefinitely, according to chemist Ric Pashley of the Australian National University in Canberra.
“Many scientists are going to find this very hard to believe,” says colloid scientist Len Fisher of the University of Bristol in England, “but Pashley has provided very strong proof that oil and water will…
