“Quasicrystals: The Hidden Gems of the Earth’s Landscape”
In the vast expanse of the Jornada del Muerto desert in New Mexico, astronomer Lincoln LaPaz stumbled upon a peculiar discovery in the autumn of 1945. While on the hunt for meteorites, LaPaz came across a shimmering crust of blood-red glass that caught his attention. Little did he know that embedded within this unusual material was a quasicrystal, a substance that was long believed to be purely theoretical due to its complex atomic structure.
Quasicrystals were once considered impossible due to their unique atomic geometry, which defied the rules of traditional crystal symmetry. Unlike conventional crystals that exhibit repeating atomic patterns, quasicrystals possess intricate arrangements that never repeat exactly in three-dimensional space. The discovery of natural quasicrystals challenged the notion that these materials could only exist under controlled laboratory conditions.
Paul Steinhardt, a physicist at Princeton University, and Dov Levine were among the first to propose the existence of quasicrystals in 1983. Their groundbreaking research paved the way for the identification of natural quasicrystals, such as the ones found in the Khatyrka meteorite by Luca Bindi at the University of Florence. The expedition to the remote Khatyrka region in Russia yielded further evidence of quasicrystals in the form of tiny grains embedded in the meteorite.
The quest for natural quasicrystals led researchers to explore unconventional methods of formation. Collaborating with Paul Asimow from the California Institute of Technology, scientists devised a simple yet effective technique to create quasicrystals by subjecting metal alloys to high-velocity impacts. This approach yielded promising results, demonstrating that quasicrystals could potentially form through natural processes like impacts.
The discovery of natural quasicrystals has opened up new avenues for understanding the Earth’s geological history and the dynamics of the solar system. These enigmatic materials, once considered rare and exotic, may be more prevalent in the Earth’s landscape than previously thought. The ongoing search for quasicrystals in nature continues to unravel the mysteries of these captivating structures, shedding light on their significance in the realm of materials science and beyond.
That’s the most surprising thing.” The method produced new quasicrystals with fivefold rotational symmetries and chemical compositions unlike anything reported before.
Encouraged by their initial success, Steinhardt and Bindi began to explore other natural and not-so-natural events that could create extreme pressures, from asteroid impacts to nuclear explosions. This exploration led them to LaPaz’s radioactive, blood-red glass.
This glass, known as trinitite, gained a cult status among collectors as it was discovered to be a remnant of the first atomic bomb test, Trinity. The bomb had blasted the desert sand into glass a few months before LaPaz went meteorite hunting around the Manhattan Project test site. Where the glass mingled with copper from a transmission line, it sparkled in a blood red hue.
The samples collected by LaPaz were dispersed into various collections, including university archives and private hands. It was in one such collection curated by trinitite enthusiast William Kolb that Bindi and Steinhardt made their next significant discovery.
In 2021, they confirmed that tiny metal globs within the trinitite contained what might be the first human-made quasicrystal. Building on this success, two years later they found another “wild” quasicrystal, this time in a sample of fulgurite, a material formed when a lightning bolt struck sand and metal from a downed power line in Nebraska.
These discoveries showed that quasicrystals form readily in chaotic environments such as explosions, impacts, or electric discharges, not just in pristine laboratory conditions. They are not merely mineralogical curiosities and can literally fall from the sky in the form of meteorites.
In a more recent development, Steinhardt, Bindi, and their colleagues thought they had found another quasicrystal in a micrometeorite collected in Italy. These micrometeorites, which fall to Earth as dust shed by space rocks, are mostly derived from ancient asteroids left behind from the early days of the solar system, such as chondrites, the same class the Khatyrka meteorite belongs to.
In 2024, Steinhardt and Bindi collaborated with Jon Larsen, a mineralogist at the University of Oslo in Norway, to sift through 5500 samples of micrometeorites looking for quasicrystals. While they found two candidates that were not quasicrystals yet, the discovery of aluminium and copper in them was remarkable. These materials are extremely rare on Earth, but finding them in meteorites suggests they may be more common in space.
The team is also investigating another lead after discovering a quasicrystal approximant in a rock from Australia, hinting at the existence of “earthborn” quasicrystals formed by dynamic processes deep within the planet.
With each new discovery, Bindi and Steinhardt underscore the fact that quasicrystals can form in extreme environments. The unpredictability of nature is what drives their quest for more discoveries.
One of the quasicrystals found in the Khatyrka meteorite had a structure that no one had predicted, defying simulations and experimental expectations. The discovery of a silicon-rich quasicrystal in the debris of the Trinity nuclear test was even more surprising, showing that ordinary minerals can exhibit forbidden patterns under the right conditions.
The stability of quasicrystals has long been a topic of debate among theorists, with many assuming that they would eventually revert to conventional crystal structures. However, recent research has found ways to model the stability of quasicrystals, overcoming the limitations of traditional density functional modelling.
As the research on quasicrystals progresses, their potential to reveal the geological and astronomical histories of celestial bodies becomes more apparent. These unique structures, formed in extreme environments, hold the key to unlocking new insights into the nature of our universe.
Quasicrystals have long been a source of fascination for researchers, with their unique atomic structures and potential for stability over long periods of time. Recent discoveries have revealed that some quasicrystals are genuinely stable, meaning they will not break down into other materials no matter how long you wait. This finding has significant implications for understanding the longevity of these materials in nature and their role as witnesses to violent shocks that create them.
Scientists like Asimow are conducting experiments to track the atomic structure of nascent quasicrystals in real time during shock compression. By matching specific quasicrystal types to distinct pressure-temperature conditions, researchers hope to uncover the history of celestial bodies from which these materials originate. This could provide valuable insights into cosmic impacts during planet formation and shed light on meteor-battered worlds like Mars and the moon.
While the search for quasicrystals in samples from Apollo missions has been unsuccessful so far, researchers remain determined. The discovery of an Australian quasicrystal approximant suggests that exotic processes in the deep Earth can also produce these forbidden symmetries, opening up a new window into hidden geological dramas below the Earth’s surface.
Although quasicrystals have not yet been found in micrometeorites or Earth rocks, the discovery of approximants provides promising leads. Researchers like Bindi are hopeful about finding quasicrystals in tiny metal droplets encased in volcanic glass, while Steinhardt believes that hunting for micrometeorites in Antarctica or Greenland could yield better results. With a goal of reaching 100,000 samples, the search for quasicrystals continues to drive scientific exploration and discovery in the field. I’m sorry, but you have not provided any information or context for me to generate a new detailed article. Please provide a topic or some key points that you would like me to include in the article.
