Prerequisite for Room Temperature Superconductor Found

YouTube - Superconductivity - A Level Physics

"Using a laser pulse, we drove the material out of its equilibrium state. A second, ultra-short pulse then enabled us to disentangle the components that characterise the interaction between the electrons while the material was returning to equilibrium. Metaphorically, it was like taking a series of snapshots of the different properties of that material at different moments."

Through this approach, the scientists found that "in this material, the repulsion between the electrons, and therefore their insulating properties, disappears even at room temperature. It is a very interesting observation, as this is the essential prerequisite for turning a material into a superconductor." What is the next step in achieving this? "We will be able to take this material as a starting point and change its chemical composition”

Phys.org, May 10, 2017 – Laser pulses reveal the superconductors of the future.

- and -

In the official news release, [researchers (see below)] have found that laser pulses are able to snap the electronic interactions in a compound containing copper, oxygen, and bismuth. The result is a condition when electrons do not repel each other. Moreover, this condition does not require a very low temperature, thus creating a superconductivity (sic) at room temperature.

Sciencetimes.com, May 11, 2017 - Creating Superconductor At Room Temperature Is Now Possible With Laser Pulses, Reseach Shows
Official Press Release

Italy’s International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA) in Trieste, Università Cattolica di Brescia and Politecnico di Milano used suitably tailored laser pulses to snap the electronic interactions in a compound containing copper, oxygen and bismuth. They were thus able to identify the condition for which the electrons do not repel each other, that is an essential prerequisite for current to flow without resistance.

sissa.it - Laser Pulses Reveal Superconductors of the Future.

A great announcement!

They figured out what makes the condition for superconducting possible. I like the phys.org article but that downs plays it a bit; compared to the sciencetimes one that says “It exists!! Using lasers!!” Not quite. They have seen where it can exist but have yet to formulate the compound. But they have a starting point; which is better than mixing a bunch of different compounds up and testing in increments or running simulations on a computer.

As I have stated before, energy delivery efficiency needs to be in place before a nuclear fusion reactor comes online. Google says between 8 – 15% is lost in transmission. 0% is a huge gain alone! Less pollution, no over production, just thought this would be perfect to hook a solar farm up to a flow battery and The Grid.

Frikken lasers, man!

As described by the Brookhaven team, if you could engineer a superconductor that can operate at room temperature, you’re golden:

Picture power grids that never lose energy, more affordable mag-lev train systems, cheaper medical imaging machines like MRI scanners, and smaller yet powerful supercomputers.

CleanTechnica.com - Get Ready For The Age Of Room Temperature Superconductors (No More Hot Laptops!).

Anywhere electricity is used.

Why did that remind of Meet the Parents??

Oh, yeah, you can milk anything with nipples.

smh

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

You could technically milk a hamster, creamer much?

The answer to this question [why superconductivity occurs under a variety of circumstances] holds major opportunities for scientific and technological development. About six percent of all electricity distributed in the U.S. is lost in transmission and distribution. Because superconductors don't lose current as they conduct electricity, they could enable ultra-efficient power grids and incredibly fast computer chips. Winding them into coils produces magnetic fields that could be used for highly-efficient generators and high-speed magnetic levitation trains.

Phys.org - Cracking the mystery of perfect superconductor efficiency.

This has a nice historic overview of superconductivity and high-temperature superconductivity. From the original liquid mercury to cuprates. Also explains electron pair up. Although I think the "6%" number is low--I'll stick with the google numbers.

Speaking of magnets. Ah yeah, I'm going there... as any fanboy will... nuclear fusion reactors.

@Arnie123, hamster milk? I guess it is better than cockroach milk.

By precisely measuring the entropy of a cerium copper gold alloy with baffling electronic properties cooled to nearly absolute zero, physicists in Germany and the United States have gleaned new evidence about the possible causes of high-temperature superconductivity and similar phenomena.

...

By studying this composition and measuring the entropy numerous times under varying conditions of stress, the Karlsruhe team was able to create a 3-D map that showed how entropy at very low yet finite temperature steadily increased as the system approached the quantum critical point.

No direct measure of entropy exists, but the ratio of entropy changes to stress is directly proportional to another ratio that can be measured: the amount the sample expands or contracts due to changes in temperature. To enable the measurements at the extraordinarily low temperatures required, the Karlsruhe team developed a method for accurately measuring length changes of less than one tenth of a trillionth of a meter—approximately one-thousandth the radius of a single atom.

...

It is quite remarkable that the entropy landscape can connect so well with the detailed profile of the quantum critical fluctuations determined from microscopic experiments such as inelastic neutron scattering, all the more so when both end up providing direct evidence to support the theory," he said

More generally, the demonstration of the pronounced entropy enhancement at a quantum critical point in a multidimensional parameter space raises new insights into the way electron-electron interactions give rise to high-temperature superconductivity, Si said. [???]

"One way to relieve the accumulated entropy of a quantum critical point is for the electrons in the system to reorganize themselves into novel phases," he said. "Among the possible phases that ensue is unconventional superconductivity, in which the electrons pair up and form a coherent macroscopic quantum state."

Phys.org, May 12, 2017 - Entropy landscape sheds light on quantum mystery.

Yet another story on superconductivity and a new discovery.

Am I being punked by phys.org?? They're all lurking and laughing their @ss off as TEOT keeps posting these things!

First, it is cool that they can measure such a small distance. Second, that the measurements can be correlated back to the original physical property in question.

Phase transition is what happens just before electrons pair up and flow (superconductivity).

From lasers in the OP (which is a quantum phenomena!!) to quantum mechanics... it seems to be getting closer every day, the room temperature superconductor singularity.

Extremely interesting and relevent to my interests. Thanks again for an excellent thread.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

It´s not about the 6% you loose on transmission, you must add up the losses in the appliances, that´s the big part of the cake.

I wonder if these are related to "skyrmions", which are magnetic vortices that travel through a conductor.

ngcm.soton.ac.uk...

Other research has shown that these actually have mass going beyond the medium they are on:

www.nature.com...

If you can create and destroy mass at will, wouldn't that be a way of having reactionless acceleration?

a reply to: stormcell
you want the mess with the weight force*, not the mass

*maybe translational error here...

a reply to: BASSPLYR

Thanks BASS! Check out the New Record for Fusion thread to see what they did with femtosecond lasers and nanowires!

a reply to: verschickter

Thanks! Seems to make sense. Energy distribution at the huge, industrial levels is something I’m not very familiar with besides knowing not to touch a high tension wire! More of 3.5 V kind of guy if you know what I mean. And a cool 35 watt all tube guitar amp!

a reply to: stormcell

Skyrmions are circular quasi-particles, right? I forget if they have or haven’t been discovered. The thing they shot the laser through is lattice in nature. When the phase transition of the material to superconductivity occurs a magnet pulse is typically observed. Then the race is one! Could be skyrmions that are the culprit, I guess.

I’ll have to go do some reading!

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Well, for some parts you need the ohms (that is, resistance) but for those that do not,transmission between the components and the 6% from the power plant, a cheap and plenty available superconductive conductor -xD- would be a huge breakthrough.

a reply to: verschickter

Yeah, you can have your mag lev train also be your electric line!

Last month or so, a group in Europe made 800 feet of superconductor power line as a demo. That was full on cooling.

Room temperature would be world changing!

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Cool!!

Room temperature Superconductivity means cost effective anti-gravity too. Real Hover boards, vehicles with no need for tires or roads. So many cool things can happen when they really get a handle on how to do this.

Super conductors will make electromagnetic rail weaponry very portable and the big installations capable of launching massive projectiles capable of stunning craters like a comet strike. Just great.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

I'm almost sure that a room temperature superconductor will allow a perpetual motion device made out of magnets.

At least, the design in my head works. Unlike Tesla, my head designs don't work.

So they talking 20-30 yrs before it's commercially available?


Game changer for sure.

a reply to: Arnie123

I ready get superconductor at near room temperature,but the result still not release. You can check and comment my Tc Figure.youtu.be...
youtu.be...

a reply to: Harmony666

You may seem like a dreamer but think about it. Put one in a wind turbine!

Money nothing and the chicks for free!!

Convert kinetic energy to electric and who needs nuclear. Except I would be prudent and make fast breeding reactors to use up the plutonium stockpiles.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Hi. Thanks for the reply.

I am a dreamer, and if you think about it, everything ever created was first dreamt about, or imagined, to put it another way.

It doesn't matter which way a room temperature superconductor is used to make energy because the authorities I'm sure, will not make these things available to the public because of what can be done with them.

Doesn't stop me from "dreaming " about what can be done with them, and methods of constructing such devices.

Meanwhile, back in the USA...

Scientists at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Stanford University have combined two microscopy techniques to peer into the interactions that occur between electrons and the atomic vibrations of a material. They found that the coupling between electrons and atomic vibrations is ten times stronger than anyone had previously believed.

This new insight could lead to superconductivity at much higher temperatures than previously thought possible, leading to a large ripple effect on applications including improved energy transmission in cables and faster electronics and communication.

In research described in the journal Science, the scientists combined an X-ray free-electron laser together with a technique called angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) to image the atomic vibrations of a material and to see how those vibrations affect the electrons in the same material.

In a 2014 paper published in Nature, Shen and his colleagues sorted out what was causing the effect. It turns out that the atomic vibrations [phonons] in the STO [strontium, titanium, oxygen] travel up into the iron selenide and give electrons the additional energy they need to pair up and carry electricity with zero loss at higher temperatures than they would on their own.

“What this experiment has shown is that the fact previous simple theory of electron-phonon interaction cannot explain the superconductivity in this compound does not mean that we need to throw out the phonon,” said Shen “It could be that all players are active, and we need to look at the problem in a more holistic way.”

spectrum.org (IEEE), July 6, 2017 - Tool Reveals Mechanism Behind High-Temperature Superconductivity.

Using lasers (again) they added atomic vibrations to their material. Again, it was an insulator at higher temperature encased in atomically thin superconductor material (STO). The iron selenide would go superconductive if the temperature was dropped low enough (8 K) but when they "kicked" it with a laser (and took photos) the atomical vibrations allowed the electron pairs to form at a warmer temperature. A massive increase from single digits to double digits above absolute zero.

Iron has electrons that are nicely distributed (they do not like to move) which is why it is magnetic. It conducts electricity because some of the electrons can move through the metal. The researchers are trying to coax the iron electrons to pair up like superconductors do with the material it is wrapped in. This and OP shows a way forward at increasing the temperature when that happens.

Now they are going to investigate further how this all interacts. Maybe it is getting the mixture of the right materials into the correct configuration and giving it a little kick (priming the pump, so to speak) to get the electrons travelling in pairs with no resistance at room temperature!

Frikken' lasers, man!