I saw this article today linked from reddit with the title “high-temperature superconductors, w00t!!“.
Let’s ignore the sensational title, that has nothing to do with the actual article for a second. So why is this noteworthy? Lets take a step back first - I’ll try to keep this short and to the point.
A superconductor is basically something that has no resistance to electrical flow whatsoever, which is a wierd and wonderful property. You can use superconductors, amongst other things to create very powerful magnets which you can use in turn to create MagLev trains and other cool stuff.
It’s really amazing that superconductors even exist, but up till now it’s only been possible to obtain this property using materials at very very low temperatures (the highest temperatures superconductivity has been achieved at to date is -135 degrees Celsius).
Superconductivity research is basically a “dead field” in Physics. It used to be the hot topic and after the discovery of Superconductivity everyone started researching it, but there have been no real breakthroughs in years [this is my understanding, based on my limited reading of the subject as part of my BSc. If I’m wrong, please correct me in the comments].
When I was studying physics I went to a lecture given by the head of the department whose field was superconductivity. He showed us the theoretical model they used for superconductors and how using this model, they could place a theoretical limit on the maximum temperature at which a material could superconduct (this was a very low temperature).
He then told us about a breakthrough in 1986 where some researchers managed to achieve superconductivity at much higher temperatures (I think there was a Nobel prize involved) and how it was found that these new “high temperature” superconductors appeared to use a different mechanism than the theory he’d used to predict a maximum temperature previously, so the old theory was still sound.
After the 1986 discovery, everyone was pretty shaken. He then noted that afterwards people found another superconductor that worked with the old mechanism, but the temperature he stated for it was higher than the theoretical limit he’d shown us at the beginning.
So I put my hand up and asked him how this could be.
So the head of the department turned his head at me, and with a look of utter disgust on his face, answered “Oh, we just had to change a constant after that”.
Physicists…
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