The Second Kind of Impossible
Page 31
IMPOSSIBLE?
A key to finding how natural quasicrystals formed in nature is knowing when and where they were created. So far, our intensive studies of Grains #126 and #126A have only managed to take us part of the way toward answering those questions for the Khatyrka meteorite.
Based on our cannon experiments and our studies of Grain #126A, we know that i-phase II formed as a direct result of an impact that incurred hundreds of millions of years ago. That impact shocked, heated, and melted a combination of metals that cooled and solidified to create i-phase II and the distinctive configuration of metals surrounding it.
On the other hand, we have also observed that the quasicrystal icosahedrite was not melted by the impact. So it definitely existed beforehand, perhaps long before the great collision in space. That leaves us with many questions yet unanswered. How and when did it form? Was it the first quasicrystal to form in the solar system? Is it common or rare? Is the currently favored hypothesis correct—did it truly form in the early solar nebula? Were there lightning storms in the nebular dust cloud, as some of us have speculated, that aided the formation of aluminum-copper alloys? Or is it possible that the quasicrystal is part of a “pre-solar grain,” formed during the demise of an older star system and traveling through space to join our solar system? Whatever the case, what other novel minerals were made? And what effect did all of this have on the evolution of our solar system?
Although we continue to pursue many different experimental approaches, as of this writing, nature still has the answers to all of those questions under lock and key. Perhaps there is more to be found in further studies of the Khatyrka meteorite. Or perhaps someone will find examples of aluminum-copper alloys in other meteorites to provide further clues.
But if I were to dream the wildest dream about where to find the right key to open the next scientific door, it would be to visit Khatyrka’s parent asteroid.
Khatyrka, like most meteors, was at one time part of a much larger parent asteroid that is still orbiting the sun. Sometime between two and four million years ago, long after the great impact, Khatyrka broke off and raced away from its parent like an errant toddler. Eventually, it got lost in the Earth’s atmosphere and either exploded in midair or crashed intact on the Earth’s surface.
If we could locate its parent asteroid, land on its surface, collect samples, and study the chemical and isotopic compositions of all the minerals they contained, the origin of Khatyrka would be revealed.
The sobering thought, though, is that there are approximately 150 million potential asteroid parents longer than a football field that are lying in the asteroid belt orbiting the sun. If one were to include smaller asteroids, the list would be much longer. So it would obviously be impossible to find Khatyrka’s parent—or even a close relative—among the huge crowd.
But you might ask yourself: Which kind of impossible is it? Impossible of the first kind? Like 1 + 1 = 3?
Or could it be the second kind of impossible, something very unlikely but absolutely worth pursuing if there were somehow a plausible way to make it happen?
I imagine that most would agree that my dream of finding Khatyrka’s parent asteroid is far too wild an idea to take seriously. But if my three-decades-long search for a natural quasicrystal has taught me anything, it is this: Pay attention whenever someone says something is impossible and take the time to reach your own independent judgment.
Space science is moving in exciting directions. NASA is currently planning an Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) to visit a large near-Earth asteroid. Sometime in the 2020s, they hope to move the asteroid into a stable orbit around the moon and recover tons of materials from its surface for further study.
Most likely, Khatyrka’s parent is in the asteroid belt and still orbiting the sun. Matthias Meier, our colleague who performed the crucial Zurich isotope experiment, has pointed out to me that carbonaceous chondrites, which include metallic aluminum-copper and aluminum-nickel alloys, might reflect sunlight differently than typical meteoritic minerals, at least for some wavelengths. That insight might help us to narrow the list of potential family members.
Suddenly, a completely far-fetched idea seems a bit less impossible. Testing has established that the Khatyrka meteorite snapped off from its parent asteroid two to four million years ago. Knowing the typical speed of an asteriod through space, it is possible to approximate where its parent might be in the asteroid belt. By studying the reflections of sunlight from the asteroids in that region, one might be able to identify an asteroid with the same chemical composition as our little Earth-bound orphan, Khatyrka. There are many uncertainties that could throw off such a calculation. Frankly, it is not even clear if it is a viable approach.
But Matthias and the rest of our team have already made a first attempt and found a possible parental candidate. It is an asteroid known as Julia 89 that lies in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and orbits the sun about once every four years. About 150 kilometers across, Julia 89 belongs to a family of asteroids that formed during a collision several hundred millions of years ago, which is roughly the same time that Khatyrka is supposed have experienced a huge impact. It reflects light with a spectrum one would expect from a CV3 chondrite.
Now ask yourself: Could you picture an expedition landing someday on Julia 89 and discovering Khatyrka’s secret?
Or would that be impossible?
Quasicrystal tilings can be made with any symmetry—for example, this pattern, comprised of five different tile shapes, has eleven-fold symmetry.
A three dimensional model (top) of an icosahedral quasicrystal built from layers (middle) composed of four different building blocks (bottom). The flanges and slots on the blocks force them to assemble in a quasicrystal arrangement.
The remarkable tiling on the Darb-i Imam shrine in Isfahan, Iran, (top) can be viewed as a quasicrystal tiling (bottom left) composed of three shapes known as girih tiles (bottom right).
The khatyrkite sample from the Florence museum in its original box (held by putty), next to a 5-cent euro coin for scale. Below, the sample is enlarged about ten times.
Luca Bindi’s electron microprobe study of the sample, measuring its chemical composition from spot to spot. Yellow represents khatyrkite, CuAl2; red is cupalite, CuAl; green is a crystal mix of AlCuFe; blue is the first natural quasicrystal, icosahedrite, Al63Cu24Fe13.
The two behemoths and the expedition team (left to right): Bogdan Makovskii, Glenn MacPherson, Will Steinhardt, Chris Andronicos, Marina Yudovskaya, Luca Bindi, Viktor Komelkov, Olya Komelkova, Paul Steinhardt, Sasha Kostin, Valery Kryachko, Michael Eddy, Vadim Distler, and, in the foreground, Bucks.
A behemoth crash; Bucks, in close-up; and a Kamchatka bear.
Russian scientist Valery Kryachko in Kamchatka (with Paul Steinhardt over his left shoulder) reviews the expedition route with the team.
Will Steinhardt along the excavation site at the Listvenitovyi Stream.
Luca Bindi and Paul celebrate their 2011 arrival at the spot along the stream where Valery discovered the Florence sample in 1979.
Valery Kryachko pans for samples; Glenn MacPherson examines a rock for evidence of a meteor strike; Valery and Luca Bindi check grains; Chris Andronicos and Paul Steinhardt (wearing mosquito gear) map geological features.
The view from the campsite at midnight.
Marina Yudovskaya and Mike Eddy during a mapping expedition; Will Steinhardt preparing to dig at the stream; Chris Andronicos armed with a rifle to defend against bears.
The team celebrating its final night in the field, with Paul Steinhardt holding a flare aloft.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My scientific curiosity was sparked at an early age by my father, a masterful storyteller who often sat me on his knee and told me the most wonderful bedtime stories. My first memories date back to the age of three. Some nights, he would spin mythical tales about giants and dragons. The stories that truly mesmerized me, though, were the real-lif
e ones about scientific struggles to unlock the secrets of nature.
I remember hearing about people like Marie Curie, Galileo Galilei, and Louis Pasteur. The scientists who starred in my bedtime stories were always more exciting than any imaginary dragon-slayer. The moment of discovery was always the climax—the instant when a scientist realizes a truth that no other human being has ever known before. My father would always dwell on that feeling, and never bothered to mention the fame that followed. The stories left an indelible impression on me. I desperately wanted to experience that same feeling. From then on, science was my passion.
I’ll never know why my father chose to tell me stories about scientists and their grand adventures. He was a lawyer and, as far as I know, had no scientific training. He passed away from cancer when I was eight years old, long before the lasting influence his stories would have on my life became clear.
My general scientific attitude was strongly influenced by Richard Feynman while I was an undergraduate at Caltech. Other research advisors of mine there—Barry Barish, Frank Sciulli, and Thomas Lauritsen—and my PhD advisor at Harvard, Sidney Coleman, contributed greatly to my scientific development, especially in the areas of particle physics and cosmology. Others played an important role in setting me on the path to explore the structure of matter. Richard Alben, Denis Weaire, and Michael Thorpe were my mentors during a summer research program at Yale University in 1973. I worked for a dozen summers at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York, with Praveen Chaudhari—a consummate scientist, mentor, and friend who encouraged me to develop my ideas about amorphous solids and, later, quasicrystals when few others would even consider them.
During my formative years at the University of Pennsylvania, I benefited from the support of my senior colleagues Gino Segrè, Ralph Amado, Tony Garito, Eli Burstein, Paul Chaikin, and Tom Lubensky. They encouraged me from the very beginning, despite the fact that the idea of quasicrystals seemed too fanciful to go anywhere. Tom patiently taught me the theoretical principles underlying condensed matter physics, and Paul introduced me to many creative experiments in his laboratory during the early years when quasicrystals first became known. They became my mentors, collaborators, and good friends. I also had the good fortune of having great students, including Dov Levine and Joshua Socolar, who made many key contributions.
When the search for natural quasicrystals began in earnest in 1998, a coterie of new people with extraordinary talents became part of my life, as described and named in this book, culminating in an unimaginably grand adventure followed by a cutting-edge scientific investigation that continues to this day.
In all of these endeavors, my role has been that of a conductor, a spectator, and always an admirer.
I cannot overemphasize the importance of our anonymous benefactor, Dave, who completely funded our scientific expedition to Kamchatka. It is only because of Dave that our journey was possible and that there is a story to tell.
Except for the expedition, essentially all of the research performed as part of the quest was done without any explicit grant support. My colleagues volunteered their energy, skills, and laboratory equipment for the benefit of science, drawing on discretionary funds and their own spare time. Everyone was eager to push the boundaries of science and to satisfy their own rapacious curiosity.
In addition to those explicitly mentioned in my story, there are many other people who contributed in different ways over the past four decades, a few of whom I would like to recognize and thank here. In exploring the fundamental physics of quasicrystals: graduate students Kevin Ingersent, Hyeong-Chai Jeong, and Mikael Rechtsman; senior scientists Marian Florescu, Paul Horn, Stellan Ostlund, S. (Joe) Poon, Sriram Ramaswamy, and Salvatore Torquato; photonics startup collaborators Joe Koepnick, Ruth Ann Mullen, Ben Shaw, and Chris Somogyi. In the science related to natural quasicrystals: students Ruth Aronoff and Jules Oppenheim; senior scholars John Beckett, Chris Ballhaus, Ahmed El Goresey, Russell Hemley, Jinping Hu, Mikhail Morozov, Jerry Poirer, Paul Robinson, George Rossman, and Paul Spry. In advice and support in recruiting financial support at Princeton: President Chris Eisgruber, Thomas Roddenberry, and James Yeh. In valuable advice on geology and expedition preparation: Wilfrid Bryan. In administrative and computer support before, during, and after the expedition: Charlene Borsack, Debbie Chapman, Laura Deevey, Vinod Gupta, Angela Q. Lewis, Martin Kicinski, and Alexander (Sasha) Tchekovskoy. My Russian tutor: David Freedel.
To be sure, the story of quasicrystals told here is a small part of a much larger international scientific endeavor. The account in this book is my personal perspective, rather than an objective third person history of the subject. There are many other creative scientists, mathematicians, and engineers around the globe who have made important contributions to the understanding of quasicrystals, many of whom are not named, including dear friends. It would not be practical or meaningful to list them all. But each of them has been instrumental in creating a new field of science and has my heartfelt gratitude and admiration.
A special source of inspiration for me has been my son Will. As his father, I cannot express the pride I feel having observed the intelligence, maturity, good humor, patience, and courage he exhibited during our time together in Kamchatka. He had good reason to be concerned about me, but it never showed. Instead, he was a stalwart companion, advisor, fellow scientist, photographer, teacher, tireless worker, and loving son. Truly an inspiration.
This book would never have come to fruition without the contributions of an invaluable friend, Kathryn McEachern. I am immeasurably grateful that Kathryn volunteered her talents to help me tell this complex story through her tireless attention to detail, meticulous editing, and stubborn perfectionism, and all with good humor and boundless imagination.
I am thankful to the legendary writer and my Princeton colleague John McPhee, who shared his priceless advice about writing and story structure with me, and to Lincoln Hollister and Will Steinhardt for reviewing a draft of the manuscript. I am also thankful to my literary agents, John Brockman and Katinka Matson, who matched me with the marvelous team at Simon & Schuster including my editor, Jonathan Cox, who supported and shepherded me patiently through many rounds of revision with flexibility and wisdom. Many thanks to my cover designer Alison Forner, my production editor Kathryn Higuchi, my copy editor Frank Chase, my designer Ruth Lee-Mui, my legal counsel Felice Javit. and my publicist Elizabeth Gay. I am grateful to Sasha Kostin, Glenn MacPherson, Chris Andronicos, Chi Ma, Luca Bindi, Lincoln Hollister, Dov Levine, An-Pang Tsai, Peter Lu, Nan Yao, and my son Will for images, and to Rick Soden for photos of models and for preparing all the photo files for publication.
Last but not least, I thank my family, friends, and scientific collaborators for sharing their love, support, and brilliance with me. This book is a paean to those individuals.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
© WILLIAM STEINHARDT
PAUL J. STEINHARDT is the Albert Einstein Professor in Science at Princeton University and director of the Princeton Center for Theoretical Science. He has received the Dirac Medal and other prestigious awards for his groundbreaking theories of the early universe and novel forms of matter. He is the coauthor of Endless Universe with Neil Turok, which describes the two competing ideas in cosmology to which he contributed. In 2014, the International Mineralogical Association named a new mineral “steinhardtite” in his honor. A fierce defender of science and scientific reasoning, Steinhardt continues to challenge conventional thinking and identify new directions ripe for exploration and innovation.
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Endless Universe: Beyond the Big Bang (with Neil Turok)
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INDEX
A note about the index: The pages referenced in this index refer to the page numbers in the print edition. Clicking on a page number will take you to the ebook location that corresponds to the beginning of that page in the print edition. For a comprehensive list of locations of any word or phrase, use your reading system’s search function.
Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations.
Air Express, 335–36, 343, 346
Alben, Richard, 308
Albrecht, Andy, 28, 67
Allende meteorite, 180–83, 190, 225, 310–11, 320
alloys, natural
AlCu, natural (stolperite), 355
Al3Fe, natural (hollisterite), 355
Al61Cu32Fe7, natural (i-phase II), 355–56, 356, 357–59
Al63Cu24Fe13, natural (icosahedrite), 221–28, 315, 315, 318
(Al,Cu)6(Fe,Cu), natural (kryachkoite) 355