Physicists in the US have discovered a material that could qualify as the first known three-dimensional example of a quantum spin liquid — an exotic theoretical phase of matter.

Quantum spin liquids were first predicted by scientists back in the 1970s. While researchers have studied them for decades, these phases largely remain a theoretical concept, although that’s not the same as saying they don’t exist.

To confuse you further, quantum spin liquids aren’t actually liquids, but a kind of solid, magnetic matter that exhibits a strange form of behaviour at the subatomic particle level, specifically in terms of its electrons.