Instead of grinding rock to bits, they would use a continuous beam of energy to vaporize it and then blow out the tiny particles that form with a high-pressure stream of injected gas. Using a novel experimental setup and a device used in fusion experiments, the researchers have now vaporized rock for the first time.

Extrusive igneous rocks are formed by the cooling of molten magma above the Earth’s surface. Lava is the name given to molten rock expelled by a volcano during an eruption, and the resulting rock after solidification and cooling, and this formation cools and solidifies much quicker than intrusive igneous rocks.

When geologists refer to magma, they’re talking about molten rock that’s still trapped underground. If this molten rock makes it to the surface and keeps flowing like a liquid, it’s called lava. They’re also the hottest variety of magma, reaching temperatures between 1,800 degrees to 2,200 degrees Fahrenheit.

When molten rock, or lava, freezes, it forms crystals. If the rock freezes quickly, the crystals do not have time to grow very big.

Explosive speed This is called the Leidenfrost effect. But when researchers rapidly inject water into a tall column of lava, the water—which is about three times lighter than the lava—will speed upward and mix with the molten rock more quickly. This may cause the vapor film to destabilize, Sonder says.

Facebook. Laze forms when lava reaching temperatures of around 2,100 degrees Fahrenheit strikes seawater. The heat boils seawater dry — not just boiling away the water, but also heating salt molecules the boiled water leaves behind, like magnesium chloride.

There is no way to stop the flow of lava, scientists say. In 1973, authorities tried to stop the flow of lava from Iceland’s Eldfell Volcano on the island of Heimaey by spraying it with 1.5 billion gallons of ice-cold seawater, hoping the cooling effects of the water would halt the lava.

First, lava is more than three times denser than water; because humans are made mostly of water, it’s three times denser than us, too. Secondly, lava’s viscosity its resistance to flow is between 100,000 and 1.1 million times higher than that of water.

You might burst into flames and burn when you hit the lava/magma’s surface (depending on the type, lava’s temperature ranges from approximately 1,200 to 2,200 degrees). You might also burn before you hit the lava/magma due to the radiant heat.

Most lava is very hot—about 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit. At those temperatures, a human would probably burst into flames and either get extremely serious burns or die.