An Airless Test for 2D Superconductors

Experiments indicate that 2D superconductors robustly allow electric current to flow without resistance. However, researchers have yet to show that many of these atomically thin films possess all of the properties required of a superconductor. Now Canhua Liu at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China and colleagues have developed a technique for measuring the superconducting behavior of 2D materials under vacuum conditions. The team tested their technique on indium grown atop a silicon crystal, confirming that the material behaves as a conventional superconductor.