Tiniest Turing patterns found in atomically thin bismuth

Chemical patterns proposed in 1952 by the British mathematician Alan Turing have been discovered at the atomic scale. Appearing as stripes in a single atomic layer of bismuth adsorbed on crystalline niobium selenide, the patterns are only 2nm (around five atoms) wide – much smaller than all other Turing patterns.

The study shows ‘that on surfaces under specific interfacial conditions, we can control and form patterns on demand’, comment chemical engineer Kourosh Kalantar-Zadeh of the University of New South Wales in Australia.