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Paul Steinhardt, “Indiana Steinhardt and the Quest for Quasicrystals” (Open Agenda, 2021)

New Books in Science, Technology, and Society

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Quasi Crystals Are a New Form of Matter

Quasi crystals violate the rules of symmetry that we thought all solids had to obey. When atoms and molecules come together they arrange themselves in some sort of three-dimensional configuration, impackd together. Before the discovery of quasi crystals, we knew of two general kinds of organization. One was random, like if you take a liquid and you freeze it very rapidly,. It will freeze into a random arrangement of atoms or molecules. A the other kind of arrangement, which is often aesthetically pleasing, is the crystal arrangement.

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