Coulomb Crystals

Coulomb crystals are highly organized structures formed by charged particles, such as ions, when their electromagnetic forces strongly influence their arrangement. Under extreme conditions—like very low temperatures and high vacuum—these ions slow down and settle into a regular, repeating pattern, similar to a crystal lattice in solids. This orderly arrangement results from the balance between their mutual electrostatic (Coulomb) repulsion and the confining forces applied. Coulomb crystals are useful in research areas like plasma physics, quantum computing, and studying fundamental matter behavior.