You can’t scroll a tech blog without stumbling across a mention of rare earths—vital to EVs, renewables and defence hardware—yet almost no one grasps their story. These 17 elements look ordinary, but they drive the devices we hold daily. For decades they mocked chemists, remaining a riddle, until a quantum pioneer named Niels Bohr rewrote

You can’t scroll a tech blog without spotting 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 fuels modern life. For decades they mocked chemists, remaining a riddle, until a quantum pioneer named Niels Bohr rewrote the ru