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Materials science

Clockwork at the atomic scale

Nature volume 533, pages 38–39 (2016)Cite this article

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Design rules for exotic materials known as polar metals have been put into practice in thin films. The findings will motivate studies of how a phenomenon called screening can be manipulated to generate new phases in metals. See Letter p.68

Any science student will tell you that metals are good conductors of electric currents, whereas insulators do not allow a current to pass. A consequence of these simple facts is that a range of physical phenomena are reserved either for only the former or the latter class of material. But in this issue, Kim et al.1 (page 68) show that some materials can, in certain respects, sit on both sides of the fence when fabricated according to particular design principles.

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Figure 1: Polar metals from perovskites.

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References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Marjana Ležaić is in the Peter Grünberg Institut-1, Quantum Theory of Materials, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich 52425, Germany.,

    Marjana Ležaić

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  1. Marjana Ležaić
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Correspondence to Marjana Ležaić.

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Ležaić, M. Clockwork at the atomic scale. Nature 533, 38–39 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature17890

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