A closer look
Staring at your perfectly smooth screen? You're actually gazing into a microscopic landscape of controlled chaos. The rod-like molecules in liquid crystal displays normally align neatly to control light. However, they frequently suffer from topological defects called disclinations—points where the crystalline order completely breaks down into a singularity. Engineers actually have to use special polymer coatings to force these molecular 'black holes' to behave so you can doomscroll in high definition.
