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Experimental physicist Rainer Blatt from the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information (IQOQI) in Innsbruck, Austria, will receive the Stern-Gerlach Medal of the German Physical Society. The medal will be presented by Germany's Research Minister Anette Schavan in Berlin on Tuesday 27 March 2012.

The fact that first graders grow crystals for science projects might lead you to think that physicists know how these snazzy shapes form and unform. Alas, there is still a big blank spot in physics textbooks where the theory of crystal melting should be.