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One hundred years ago, Enrico Fermi and Paul Dirac worked out how fermions distribute across the quantum states available to them. Their intuition laid the statistical foundation for the study of systems ranging from solids to white dwarfs.
A recently proposed class of magnets, so-called altermagnets, combine features of ferromagnets and antiferromagnets. We discuss the scientific appeal of altermagnets, current controversies and challenges for their practical use.
