Not frozen accidents, quasicrystals change how we define atomic order

The article discusses a significant advancement in understanding quasicrystals—materials whose atomic arrangements are ordered but non-repeating, defying traditional definitions of crystal structures. Discovered in the 1980s, quasicrystals initially faced skepticism, with many scientists believing they were merely accidental, unstable formations resulting from rapid cooling of molten materials. The key unresolved question was whether quasicrystals are thermodynamically stable or just frozen irregularities. Traditional computational methods like density functional theory (DFT), which rely on repeating units, could not effectively model quasicrystals due to their aperiodic nature. Researchers at the University of Michigan addressed this challenge by simulating small nanoparticles of quasicrystals and extrapolating their energies to estimate the stability of the bulk material. They applied this approach to two known quasicrystals—scandium-zinc and ytterbium-cadmium alloys—and demonstrated that these structures have the lowest possible energy configurations, proving their intrinsic stability rather than