Day 3 and there’s no let up in the number of chats and questions – 4,400 students registered and nearly 2,500 answered questions, not to mention loads more chats!

Today’s highlights in the Crystallography Zone:

• Talk of potato plants…

scoodle12 : What would happen if the potato plant died out or if any other food plant died out?

benjaminhall : It depends really, the potato is a massively important food crop (the 4th most important in the world) and if it disappeared then we’d have a big shortage of food. The same goes for things like wheat and maize.

brandinosaur69 : But initially you could grow a whole new potato plant in its self from just a few chemicals

benjaminhall : I think I’m fairly clever but not clever enough to spontaneously create a potato.

• We find out about arthritis:

esnughh : how does arthiritus work

davidbriggs : Arthritis is a disease we get when the cartilage in our joints starts to breakdown – it causes lots of pain and swelling in your joints. Everyone will get it eventually – it can be very very painful.

• And crystallised viruses can be pretty dangerous:

What is the most dangerous crystal?