In just over a week scientists will celebrate the centenary of superconductivity: the discovery, in 1911, that some materials cooled towards absolute zero allow electric charge to flow without resistance. But now one physicist believes superconductivity can appear when there is no material at all.
According to Maxim Chernodub of the Université François-Rabelais Tours in France, superconductivity can appear – provided there is a very strong magnetic field – in the vacuum of empty space. If Chernodub is correct, the phenomenon could explain the origin of the extensive magnetic-field patterns seen in the cosmos. "This suggested vacuum superconductivity is very unusual," he says. "It has a few crazy properties that do not exist in 'normal' superconductors."
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