Vanadium dioxide’s weird phase transition just got weirder
As the material switches from insulator to conductor, its atoms move chaotically
![vanadium atoms](https://i0.wp.com/www.sciencenews.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/103118_MT_disorderly-atoms_feat.jpg?fit=860%2C460&ssl=1)
JUMBLED UP When hit with laser light, vanadium atoms (blue in this illustration) and oxygen atoms (red) in vanadium dioxide reorganize into a new crystal structure. The atoms’ movements during this change are much more disorderly than expected.
Delaire group/Duke University