Dancing electrons solve a longstanding puzzle in the oldest magnetic material

Amazing stuff!

"when the temperature is lowered below 125 kelvins, magnetite changes from a metal to an insulator, its atoms shift to a new lattice structure, and its charges form a complicated ordered pattern. This extraordinarily complex phase transformation, which was discovered in the 1940s and is known as the Verwey transition, was the first metal-insulator transition ever observed. For decades, researchers have not understood exactly how this phase transformation was happening.
According to a paper published March 9  ..., an international team of experimental and theoretical researchers discovered fingerprints of the quasiparticles that drive the Verwey transition in magnetite. Using an ultrashort laser pulse [ultrafast terahertz spectroscopy,” an advanced laser apparatus based on ultrashort pulses in the extreme infrared], the researchers were able to confirm the existence of peculiar electronic waves that are frozen at the transition temperature and start “dancing together” in a collective oscillating motion as the temperature is lowered.  "

Dancing electrons solve a longstanding puzzle in the oldest magnetic material | MIT News: Scientists have discovered fingerprints of the quasiparticles that drive the puzzling Verwey phase transition in magnetite. The work was led by an international team of experimental and theoretical researchers led by MIT professor of physics Nuh Gedik.