{"id":236730,"date":"2026-05-07T22:10:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T03:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/05\/quantum-metallurgy-electron-crystals-deform-and-melt"},"modified":"2026-05-07T22:10:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T03:10:08","slug":"quantum-metallurgy-electron-crystals-deform-and-melt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/05\/quantum-metallurgy-electron-crystals-deform-and-melt","title":{"rendered":"Quantum metallurgy: Electron crystals deform and melt"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/quantum-metallurgy-electron-crystals-deform-and-melt.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In a process analogous to how solids melt into liquids, the electrons in many different metals form crystal-like patterns that can deform and melt, opening new pathways for neuromorphic computing and superconductors, University of Michigan Engineering researchers have found.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur work shows that these quantum structures, which are often thought to have a highly ordered structure, actually span a continuum of disorder that could be leveraged to engineer and control these materials,\u201d said Robert Hovden, associate professor of materials science and engineering and corresponding author of the study <a href=\"https:\/\/linkinghub.elsevier.com\/retrieve\/pii\/S2590238526000287\" target=\"_blank\">published<\/a> in Matter.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMetallurgists often control <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/news\/2022-12-defects-invisible-material-properties.html?utm_source=embeddings&utm_medium=related&utm_campaign=internal\" rel=\"related\">defects<\/a>, or disorder, in metals to produce specific properties,\u201d Hovden said. \u201cA similar approach might help us harness the potential of quantum materials in future devices. Quantum metallurgy could be the future.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a process analogous to how solids melt into liquids, the electrons in many different metals form crystal-like patterns that can deform and melt, opening new pathways for neuromorphic computing and superconductors, University of Michigan Engineering researchers have found. \u201cOur work shows that these quantum structures, which are often thought to have a highly ordered [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1523,38,1617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-236730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computing","category-engineering","category-quantum-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=236730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236730\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=236730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=236730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=236730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}