A team of international scientists including Maia G. Vergniory, Ikerbasque researcher at DIPC and UPV/EHU associate, has discovered a new class of materials, higher-order topological insulators. Theoretical physicists first predicted the existence of these insulators, which have conducting properties on the edges of crystals rather than on their surfaces, and conduct electricity without dissipation. Now, these novel properties are demonstrated experimentally in bismuth.