May 15, 2026
Crystal chaos from outer space
Naturally Occurring Quasicrystals
These freaky space crystals may come from asteroid crashes, lightning, and even bomb blasts
TLDR: Scientists say the rarest natural quasicrystals on Earth may come from violent events like asteroid crashes and lightning strikes, with three found in a single bizarre meteorite. Commenters were split between amazement, math rabbit holes, and a spicy debate over whether anything involving power lines or nuclear blasts should count as “natural.”
Quasicrystals are basically the rebels of the crystal world: solid materials with beautiful patterns that never quite repeat. The article’s big jaw-dropper is that the only three confirmed natural examples were all found in one weird meteorite in remote Russia—and nowhere else. Add in a maybe-natural case from Nebraska, where lightning or a fallen power line may have zapped sand into forming one, plus a bomb-test example from Trinity, and commenters were instantly hooked by the sheer chaos of the origin story. As one reader basically summed it up: these things only show up when nature is having an absolutely terrible day.
The community vibe was a glorious mix of nerd awe, book-club energy, and “wait, that counts as natural?” fighting. One camp loved the science and started dropping rabbit holes, from prime number patterns to a recommended book, The Second Kind of Impossible, about the years-long hunt for quasicrystals. Another corner of the comments went fully apocalypse-core, sharing even stranger byproducts of nuclear blasts and arguing over whether a crystal born from lightning hitting a power cable gets to wear the “natural” crown. And because no comment thread can stay normal, someone swerved into blue virus-infected isopods as another example of nature making bizarre patterns. In other words: the science was cool, but the real show was the comment section asking whether these crystals are rare miracles, disaster souvenirs, or just the universe showing off.
Key Points
- •The article says naturally occurring quasicrystals are extremely rare and are associated with high-energy events such as asteroid impacts, lightning-related fulgurites, and nuclear explosions.
- •It states that the first three types of natural quasicrystals were all found in the Khatyrka meteorite in far eastern Russia and have not been found elsewhere.
- •The three Khatyrka quasicrystals identified are icosahedrite (Al63Cu24Fe13), decagonite (Al71Ni24Fe5), and i-Phase II (Al62Cu31Fe7).
- •Icosahedrite and i-Phase II are described as fully icosahedral quasicrystals modeled using the slice-and-project method from the D6 lattice, while decagonite is described using the A4 lattice.
- •A separate Earth-surface example in Nebraska is described as an ambiguously natural quasicrystal in a fulgurite, with approximate composition Mn72.3Si15.6Cr9.7Al1.8Ni0.6 and 12-fold symmetry in nonrepeating planes.