The high tech camera that can snap snowflakes in 3D as they fall

 A high-tech new camera can snap individual snowflakes in three-dimensions as they are in freefall - and could lead to more accurate weather predictions.

The Multi-Angle Snowflake Camera (MASC), developed by researchers at the University of Utah, uses three high-speed cameras triggered by infra-red sensors to capture snow flakes as they float by.

With an exposure timing as quick as 1/25,000 of a second, the device can also measure the speed the flakes are falling - all without touching them.

'You've probably seen gorgeous pictures of snowflakes that have been collected on glass slides and put under a microscope,' University of Utah atmospheric scientist Tim Garrett told LiveScience.

'These pictures, while beautiful, are pictures of snowflakes that are exceedingly rare.'

Most snowflakes found in nature are in fact clumps of many of such flakes stuck to each other and putting one of those on a microscope slide would destroy it.

But accurate analysis of snow flakes - known to scientists as hydrometeors - is essential to forecasters trying to create better models for the behaviour of snow storms.

The three-dimensional, super-accurate images offered by MASC, could therefore help weather simulations predict snowfall more accurately.

Previously, such models have been based on measurements of snowflakes painstakingly done by hand in the Seventies, by researchers who were only able to collect a few thousand.

'I knew the guy who did it and he felt he needed to get glasses because of this project,' Professor Garrett said.

Thanks to MASC, however, researchers can now photograph and measure tens of thousands of snowflakes in a single night.

Two such devices installed in the Alta Ski Area in Utah's Wasatch Mountains have already collected enough data to prompt a revision of how previous weather models explain the interaction of wind and snow.

Professor Garrett and a colleague have now formed a company to sell market their gadget and have already sold one to the U.S. military, which is using it to try to better their earthquake predictions.

The professor said that as well as being a useful meteorological tool, the MASC is actually also great fun to use.

'When people say no two snowflakes are alike, that is very true. They are dissimilar in ways that I did not imagine prior to starting this project. The range of possibilities is immense,' he said.