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Israeli wins Nobel Chemistry Prize for quasicrystals work
Oct 5, 2011, 11:32 GMT
Stockholm - The 2011 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was Wednesday awarded to Israeli researcher Daniel Shectman for 'the discovery of quasicrystals,' the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said.
'In quasicrystals, we find the fascinating mosaics of the Arabic world reproduced at the level of atoms: regular patterns that never repeat themselves,' the citation said.
Shechtman's discovery in April 1982 challenged the previous concept that 'in all solid matter, atoms were believed to be packed inside crystals in symmetrical patterns that were repeated periodically over and over again. For scientists, this repetition was required in order to obtain a crystal,' it added.
Quasicrystals have since been produced in labs and also found in a Russian river as well as in a certain form of steel.
Shechtman of Technion - Israel Institute of technology in Haifa, is the sole winner of the 10-million-kronor (1.4-million-dollars) prize.
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