You can’t scroll a tech blog without spotting a mention of rare earths—vital to EVs, renewables and defence hardware—yet almost very few grasps their story. These 17 elements seem ordinary, but they power the gadgets we carry daily. For decades they mocked chemists, remaining a riddle, until a quantum pioneer named Niels Bohr rewrote the r

You can’t scroll a tech blog without bumping into a mention of rare earths—vital to EVs, renewables and defence hardware—yet almost no one grasps their story. Seventeen little-known elements underwrite the tech that runs modern life. For decades they mocked chemists, remaining a riddle, until a quantum pioneer named Niels Bohr rewrote the