Water

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A globule of liquid water, and the concave depression and rebound in water caused by something dropping through the water surface.

Water (chemical formula H2O) is an inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless chemical substance, which is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living organisms (in which it acts as a solvent). It is vital for all known forms of life, despite providing neither food, energy, nor organic micronutrients.

A number of natural states of water exist. It forms precipitation in the form of rain and aerosols in the form of fog. Clouds consist of suspended droplets of water and ice, its solid state. When finely divided, crystalline ice may precipitate in the form of snow. The gaseous state of water is steam or water vapor. Water covers about 71% of the Earth's surface, mostly in seas and oceans, about 96.5%.

Fishing in salt and fresh water bodies is a major source of food for many parts of the world, providing 6.5% of global protein. Large quantities of water, ice, and steam are used for cooling and heating, in industry and homes. Water is an excellent solvent for a wide variety of substances both mineral and organic; as such it is widely used in industrial processes, and in cooking and washing.

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This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Water, which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (view authors). Wikipedia logo