Most water ice in the universe is in a form which does not occur natur
ally on Earth and of which only minimal amounts have been made in the
laboratory. We have encountered this ''high-density amorphous ice'' in
electron diffraction experiments of low-temperature (T < 30 K) vapor-
deposited water and have subsequently modeled its structure using mole
cular dynamics simulations. The characteristic feature of high-density
amorphous ice is the presence of ''interstitiaI'' oxygen pair distanc
es between 3 and 4 Angstrom. However, we find that the structure is be
st described as a collapsed lattice of the more familiar low-density a
morphous form. These distortions are frozen in at temperatures below 3
8 K because, we propose, it requires the breaking of one hydrogen bond
, on average, per molecule to relieve the strain and to restructure th
e lattice to that of low-density amorphous ice. Several features of as
trophysical ice analogs studied in laboratory experiments are readily
explained by the structural transition from high-density amorphous ice
into low-density amorphous ice. Changes in the shape of the 3.07 mu m
water band, trapping efficiency of CO, CO loss, changes in the CO ban
d structure, and the recombination of radicals induced by low-temperat
ure UV photolysis all covary with structural changes that occur in the
ice during this amorphous to amorphous transition. While the 3.07 mu
m ice band in various astronomical environments can be modeled with sp
ectra of simple mixtures of amorphous and crystalline forms, the contr
ibution of the high-density amorphous form nearly always dominates.