HOW NIELS BOHR CRACKED THE RARE-EARTH CODE

Rare earths are today steering debates on electric vehicles, wind turbines and advanced defence gear. Yet most readers often confuse what “rare earths” really are. These 17 elements look ordinary, but they anchor the technologies we hold daily. For decades they mocked chemists, remaining a riddle, until a quantum pioneer named Niels Bohr rewr

You can’t scroll a tech blog without spotting a mention of rare earths—vital to EVs, renewables and defence hardware—yet almost very few grasps their story. Seventeen little-known elements underwrite the tech that runs modern life. For decades they mocked chemists, remaining a riddle, until a quantum pioneer named Niels Bohr rewrote the r