Xue-Jia Yu

Acoustic Experiments Show Topology Can Survive at Critical Points

Physicists have experimentally shown that topology can persist even at gapless critical points, challenging a long-standing assumption that topological order must disappear when a system closes its energy gap. The result, reported through a pair of closely linked Nature papers and highlighted by Phys.org and EurekAlert, could reshape how researchers think about phase transitions in quantum materials, metamaterials, and other engineered systems.