Superconductors have intrigued physicists for decades. But these materials, which allow the perfect, lossless flow of electrons, usually only exhibit this quantum-mechanical peculiarity at temperatures so low – a few degrees above absolute zero – as to render them impractical.
A research team led by Harvard Professor of Physics and Applied Physics Philip Kim has demonstrated a new strategy for making and manipulating a widely studied class of higher-temperature superconductors, called cuprates, clearing a path to engineering new, unusual forms of superconductivity in previously unattainable materials.
Using a uniquely low-temperature device fabrication method, Kim and his team report in the journal Science a promising candidate for the world’s first high-temperature, superconducting diode – essentially, a switch that makes current flow in one direction – made out of thin cuprate crystals. Such a device could theoretically fuel fledging industries like quantum computing, which rely on fleeting mechanical phenomena that are difficult to sustain.
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