The Mystery of How Quasicrystals Form

The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine. Since their discovery in 1982, exotic materials known as quasicrystals have bedeviled physicists and chemists. Their atoms arrange themselves into chains of pentagons, decagons, and other shapes to form patterns that never quite repeat. These patterns seem to defy physical laws and intuition. How can…

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Why US Power Bills Are Surging

Now, electricity prices are surging in addition to all of the uncorked demand from the Covid-19 pandemic, when the global economic slowdown and pressure from policymakers kept a lid on utility bills. ā€œI think if we were to repeat this analysis for next year, there would probably be a little bit of an uptick this…

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