"God doesn't play dice with the world." Albert Einstein

Element 83, Bismuth lives nestled on the Periodic Table between two less than benign metals. Polonium, a nasty radioactive and hazardous material, and lead, also not good for humans. Bismuth first appears at the end of the Medieval ages around 1400, but it wasn't until 1753 that it found its place as an element.

It's safe to play with, no real discernable odor, low melting point, functionally as heavy as lead, and can it be an extraordinarily beautiful and fun material to play with. I think in the picture below, I used too much cayenne pepper.

So why the peculiar title for a blog post? Out of comment by made A, and something B read earlier that day an idea and a small company (A+B) was formed to do something that hadn't been done before on a much larger scale. Einstein's quote was based on his belief that there is an order to everything in the physical world, and Bismuth is no exception. So what rules does Bismuth operate under? Not surprisingly they are conceptionally similar to other materials that grow crystals if prodded, but like Professor Hill said in the Music Man, "You gotta know the territory."

So we bought Bismuth, a whole lot of it, and the delivery guys now hate us. Instrumentation, casting molds for prototyping, downloading technical papers, a gas-fired crucible, safety gear, fire extinguishers (you never know), and started to explore the material with ever-increasing success. Science does work, but the real beauty is the magnificent and beautiful crystalline chaos that occurs.

So are we going to tell you what we are doing? Nope but we will drop some clues from time to time for those who want to try making crystals on their stovetop, and as we have learned, even the mistakes can be stunning.