World’s first metallic hydrogen sample disappears

The world’s only sample of metallic hydrogen created in the lab – touted as the “holy grail of high-pressure physics” – has disappeared according to Harvard scientists.

Last month physicists from Harvard University in the US had claimed to have successfully turned hydrogen into a metal – something researchers had been struggling to achieve for more than 80 years.

However, the team has now announced that the sample has disappeared. The metallic hydrogen was being stored at temperatures around minus 193 degrees Celsius and at incredibly high pressures between two diamonds.

Further testing caused the diamonds to break and the researchers have not been able to find the metallic hydrogen since. The sample was only around 1.5 micrometres thick and 10 micrometres in diameter – a fifth the diameter of a strand of human hair.