A block of rubber that can count to ten and even remember the order in which it is pressed. Physicists Martin van Hecke and Lennard Kwakernaak (Leiden University and AMOLF Amsterdam) publish about this latest metamaterial in the journal Physical Review Letters. ‘I like finding complexity in simple things.’

With a big smile PhD candidate Kwakernaak enters the room, the showpiece in his hands: a piece of soft rubber with 22 beams in pairs. ‘This is our beam counter. Push it,’ he encourages. The result is unexpected. The bars all bend to the left except the first one, which bends to the right. ‘That first bar then pushes the next pair to the right and that moves along one position each time you push the material. That's how the material counts to ten.’

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