List of states of

matter

Mat t er organizes int o various phases or st at es of mat t er depending on it s const it uent s and
ext ernal fact ors like pressure and t emperat ure. In common t emperat ures and pressures, at oms
form t he t hree classical st at es of mat t er: solid, liquid and gas. Complex molecules can also form
various mesophases such as liquid cryst als, which are int ermediat e bet ween t he liquid and solid
phases. At high t emperat ures or st rong elect romagnet ic fields at oms become ionized, forming
plasma.

At low t emperat ures, t he elect rons of solid mat erials can also organize int o various elect ronic
phases of mat t er, such as t he superconduct ing st at e, which is charact erized by vanishing
resist ivit y. Magnet ic st at es such as ferromagnet ism and ant iferromagnet ism can also be
regarded as phases of mat t er in which t he elect ronic and nuclear spins organize int o different
pat t erns. Such st at es of mat t er are st udied in condensed mat t er physics.

In ext reme condit ions found in some st ars and in t he early universe, at oms break int o t heir
const it uent s and mat t er exist s as some form of degenerat e mat t er or quark mat t er. Such
st at es of mat t er are st udied in high-energy physics.

In t he 20t h cent ury, increased underst anding of t he propert ies of mat t er result ed in t he
ident ificat ion of many st at es of mat t er. This list includes some not able examples.
Low-energy states of matter

Classical states

Solid: A solid holds a definite shape and

volume and then without the need of a
container. The particles are held very
close to each other.
Amorphous solid: A solid in which
there is no far-range order of the
positions of the atoms.
Crystalline solid: A solid in which
atoms, molecules, or ions are
packed in regular order.
 Quasicrystal: A solid in which the
positions of the atoms have long-
range order, but this is not in a
repeating pattern.
Different structural phases of
polymorphic materials are
considered to be different states of
matter in the Landau theory. For an
example, see Ice § Phases.
Liquid: A mostly non-compressible fluid.
Able to conform to the shape of its
container but retains a (nearly) constant
volume independent of pressure.
Gas: A compressible fluid. Not only will a
gas take the shape of its container but it
will also expand to fill the container.
Mesomorphic states: States of matter
intermediate between solid and liquid.
Plastic crystal: A molecular solid
with long-range positional order but
with constituent molecules retaining
rotational freedom.
Liquid crystal: Properties
intermediate between liquids and
crystals. Generally, able to flow like
a liquid but exhibiting long-range
orientational order.
Supercritical fluid: At sufficiently high
temperatures and pressures, the
 distinction between liquid and gas
disappears.
Plasma: Unlike gases, which are
composed of neutral atoms, plasma
contains a significant number of free
electrons and ionized atoms. It may
self-generate magnetic fields and
electric currents and responds strongly
and collectively to electromagnetic
forces.[1]

Condensates, superfluids and

superconductors

Bose–Einstein condensate: A phase in

which a large number of bosons all
inhabit the same quantum state, in
effect becoming one single
wave/particle. This is a low-energy
phase that can only be formed in
laboratory conditions and at very low
temperatures. It must be close to zero
kelvin, or absolute zero. Satyendra Nath
Bose and Albert Einstein predicted the
existence of such a state in the 1920s,
but it was not observed until 1995 by
Eric Cornell and Carl Wieman.
Fermionic condensate: Similar to the
Bose-Einstein condensate but
composed of fermions, also known as
Fermi-Dirac condensate. The Pauli
exclusion principle prevents fermions
from entering the same quantum state,
but a pair of fermions can be bound to
each other and behave like a boson, and
two or more such pairs can occupy
quantum states of a given total
momentum without restriction.
Superconductivity: A phenomenon of
exactly zero electrical resistance and
expulsion of magnetic fields occurring in
certain materials when cooled below a
characteristic critical temperature.
Superconductivity is the ground state of
many elemental metals.
Superconductors come in multiple
varieties:
Conventional superconductor: A
superconductor described by the
BCS theory with a singlet order
parameter.
Unconventional superconductor: A
superconductor which breaks
additional symmetries. For
example, d-wave or triplet
superconductor, or a Fulde–Ferrell–
Larkin–Ovchinnikov
superconductor.
Ferromagnetic superconductor:
Materials that display intrinsic
coexistence of ferromagnetism and
superconductivity.
 Charge-4e superconductor: A
proposed state in which electrons
are not bound as Cooper pairs but
as quadruplets of electrons.
Superfluid: A phase achieved by a few
cryogenic liquids at extreme
temperature at which they become able
to flow without friction. A superfluid can
flow up the side of an open container
and down the outside. Placing a
superfluid in a spinning container will
result in quantized vortices.
Supersolid: similar to a superfluid, a
supersolid can move without friction but
retains a rigid shape.
Magnetic states

Ferromagnetism: A state of matter with

spontaneous magnetization.
Antiferromagnetism: A state of matter
in which the neighboring spin are
antiparallel with each other, and there is
no net magnetization.
Ferrimagnetism: A state in which local
moments partially cancel.
Altermagnetism: A state with zero net
magnetization and spin-split electronic
bands.
Spin-density wave: An ordered state in
which spin density is periodically
 modulated.
Helimagnetism: A state with spatially
rotating magnetic order.
Spin glass: A magnetic state
characterized by randomness.
Quantum spin liquid: A disordered state
in a system of interacting quantum spins
which preserves its disorder to very low
temperatures, unlike other disordered
states.

Electronically ordered states

Ferroelectricity: A state of matter with

spontaneous electric polarization.
 Antiferroelectricity: A state of matter in
which the adjacent electric dipoles point
in opposite directions.
Charge ordering
Charge density wave: An ordered state
in which charge density is periodically
modulated.

Topological states of matter

Quantum Hall state: A topological state

of matter with quantized Hall resistance.
Fractional quantum Hall state: A
state with fractionally charged
quasiparticles. Hall resistance is
 quantized to fractional multiples of
resistance quantum.
Quantum spin Hall state: a
theoretical phase that may pave the
way for the development of
electronic devices that dissipate
less energy and generate less heat.
This is a derivative of the quantum
Hall state of matter.
Quantum anomalous Hall state: A
state which has a quantized Hall
resistance even in the absence of
external magnetic field.
Topological insulator: a material whose
interior behaves as an electrical
insulator while its surface behaves as an
electrical conductor.
Fractional Chern insulator: A
generalization of fractional quantum
Hall state to electrons on a lattice.
Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless state: A
2D state with unbound vortex-antivortex
pairs.
String-net liquid: Atoms in this state
have unstable arrangements, like a
liquid, but are still consistent in the
overall pattern, like a solid.
Topological semimetals:[2]
Weyl semimetal
Dirac semimetal
 Topological superconductor[3]

Classification by conductivity
Met allic and insulat ing st at es of mat erials can be considered as different quant um phases of
mat t er connect ed by a met al-insulat or t ransit ion. Mat erials can be classified by t he st ruct ure of
t heir Fermi surface and zero-t emperat ure dc conduct ivit y as follows:[4]

Metal:
Fermi liquid: a metal with well-
defined quasiparticle states at the
Fermi surface.
Non-Fermi liquid: Various metallic
states with unconventional
properties.
Insulator
Band insulator: A material that is
insulating due to a band gap in its
electronic spectrum
 Mott insulator: A material that is
insulating due to interactions
between electrons.
Anderson insulator: A material that
is insulating due to disorder-
induced interference effects.
Charge-transfer insulators

Miscellaneous states

Time crystals: A state of matter where

an object can have movement even at its
lowest energy state.
Hidden states of matter: Phases that
are unattainable or do not exist in
thermal equilibrium, but can induced e.g.
by photoexcitation.
Chain-melted state: Metals, such as
potassium, at high temperature and
pressure, present properties of both a
solid and liquid.
Wigner crystal: a crystalline phase of
low-density electrons.
Hexatic state, a state of matter that is
between the solid and the isotropic
liquid phases in two dimensional
systems of particles.
Ferroics
Ferroelastic state, a phenomenon in
which a material may exhibit a
 spontaneous strain.

High energy states

Degenerate matter: Matter under very

high pressure, supported by the Pauli
exclusion principle.
Electron-degenerate matter: Found
inside white dwarf stars. Electrons
remain bound to atoms but can
transfer to adjacent atoms.
Neutron-degenerate matter: Found
in neutron stars. Vast gravitational
pressure compresses atoms so
strongly that the electrons are
forced to combine with protons via
inverse beta decay, resulting in a
super dense conglomeration of
neutrons. (Normally free neutrons
outside an atomic nucleus will
decay with a half-life of just under
fifteen minutes, but in a neutron
star, as in the nucleus of an atom,
other effects stabilize the
neutrons.)
Strange matter: A type of quark
matter that may exist inside some
neutron stars close to the Tolman–
Oppenheimer–Volkoff limit
(approximately 2–3 solar masses).
 May be stable at lower energy
states once formed.
Quark matter: Hypothetical phases of
matter whose degrees of freedom
include quarks and gluons
Color-glass condensate
Color superconductivity
Quark–gluon plasma: A phase in
which quarks become free and able
to move independently (rather than
being perpetually bound into
particles, or bound to each other in
a quantum lock where exerting
force adds energy and eventually
solidifies into another quark) in an
 ocean of gluons (subatomic
particles that transmit the strong
force that binds quarks together).
May be briefly attainable in particle
accelerators, or possibly inside
neutron stars.
For up to 10−35 seconds after the Big
Bang, the energy density of the universe
was so high that the four forces of
nature – strong, weak, electromagnetic,
and gravitational – are thought to have
been unified into one single force. The
state of matter at this time is unknown.
As the universe expanded, the
temperature and density dropped and
 the gravitational force separated, a
process called symmetry breaking.

References

1. A. Pickover, Clifford (2011). "Plasma". The

Physics Book. Sterling. pp. 248–249.
ISBN 978-1-4027-7861-2.
2. Armitage, N. P.; Mele, E. J.; Vishwanath,
Ashvin (2018-01-22). "Weyl and Dirac
semimetals in three-dimensional solids" (ht
tps://doi.org/10.1103%2FRevModPhys.90.
015001) . Reviews of Modern Physics. 90
(1): 015001. arXiv:1705.01111 (https://arxi
v.org/abs/1705.01111) .
Bibcode:2018RvMP...90a5001A (https://ui.
adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2018RvMP...90a5