An interesting type of superconductors available to us today are the ones that achieve this property at room temperature, with only the small snag that they require crushing pressures that would render biological lifeforms into a very thin layer of molecules. What these however suggest is that something in these materials changes at these high pressures, and if we could retain that state upon releasing said pressure, we might be able to have our superconducting cake and eat it too.
This is effectively what researchers recently achieved, with a research article in PNAS Physics by [Liangzi Deng] et al. covering the pressure-quench protocol (PQP) that they used for this feat. There is also an associated easy-to-read press release by Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) as well as one by the University of Houston.
Target material was a cuprate, specifically HgBa2Ca2Cu3O8+δ, also known as the HBCCO series or Hg1223 for short. Hg1223 has been the subject of much research and experimentation since the 1990s, with it demonstrating a transition temperature (Tc) of 133 K (-140°C). With this quenching method – which sees the high pressures on the cooled sample suddenly released – this bumped the Tc up to 151 K, or -122°C.
While still a far cry from room temperature superconductors, managing to lock in these superconducting properties at an 18 K higher temperature using a straightforward procedure does raise the prospect of massively reducing the cooling needs for superconductors.
If we could invent a way to passively extract energy from water by splitting hydrogen and oxygen and then recombining them for more energy, then the issue of cooling would be pretty much solved.
Thermodynamics says no, unfortunately. Splitting the water takes exactly as much energy as you get from recombining, even with 100% efficiency it would only be storage
So to rephrase this: As soon as we have a perpetual motion machine the issue of cooling would be pretty much solved.
Water is an ash.
Any attempt to separate it and burn the H2 and O2 is like trading dollars for pesos on a 1:1 basis.
I’m with you, that said there’s a premium on transport and smelting energy. If solar is cheap enough, hydrogen becomes practical, as extremely light energy, for aviation, the problem is it’s more bulky, high in volume 3 times as much volume as a avgas kerosene. So an all wing design, with a large triangular centre tank, hides the volume drag, as a lift wing, less air resistance, due to less weight, less lift requirements. Synergy, that makes the energy loss, creating the fuel worthwhile, but you have to reorganise an entire industry.
Hydrogen, makes no sense on a smaller scale, but in bulk, it can store solar energy, for shipping, desalination, electrolysis, cryogenic liquefaction, all just energy. Totally dependent, on the price of energy per kWh, with shipping, needing to be reorganised, the whole industry. It has actually happened before, liquid natural gas, carbon fibre aviation, the first all wing commercial aircraft, is being developed. Unconventional hydrocarbons, fracked gas, shale oil and tar sands, 100% loss, before the fuel is even burned, for the transport energy premium. Two engine carbon fibre jumbos, have replaced the 4 engined aluminium jumbos. I’m being too long winded, but you get the jist. Solar and electric vehicles are huge, we only see the tip of the iceberg.
Hydrogen is very difficult to keep. It leaks out. Good for explosive mixtures at almost every conversation.
There is no way to”passively” denature water into hydrogen and oxygen. The amount of energy needed to make the two separate is always equal to what you get out when they recombine.
not necessarily because “passively” could still be a focused energy beam of solar radiation or something that uses energy directly from a renewable energy generator of some kind. or some type of catalytic chamber.
I wonder about trapping the superconductor inside a material that shrinks as it cools, perhaps something a bit like old blacksmithing or glass blowing techniques, exerting enough pressure to make a superconducting wire or sheet. A superconducting prince Rupert’s drop perhaps.
I’ve had a similar idea. The idea of cladding it with some material to keep it under pressure.
My guess is we just need more experimentation to find some way to lower the pressures and raise the temperatures still.
The highest temp superconductor (according to Wikipedia) has a temperature of something like – 20C and needs to be under Gigapascals of pressure which is way to high for practically anything but diamond anvils.
If this technique could help that we might get closer though.
This idea has been rattling around inside my head too! My thought was something like a crystal lattice through which that we could create a line of defects where there are inclusions of the super conducting material (the fact that this is a crazy alloy with lots of different elements makes this a bit harder because I think the crystal would be happiest with a thinner ‘fault line’) but the gist would be that you could do the defects while the crystal was hot and expanded and there was excess room in the lattice, then crystalize more lattice around it as it cooled, which would work like a vice and keep the interior under immense pressure.
this is possibly a doped nanotube… at the molecular scale pressure is just different formations/deformations of geometry, look at all the different types of ice there are.
i don’t think what you’re trying to explore is a thing, it’s either a diamond anvil or gravity that deforms the crystal structure.
now the prince rupert’s drop could be used to mechanically pressure a sample, but then what? it can’t be done on a large scale to a large enough amount of material to make a wire, only something much shorter.
would be interesting to push the concept though just to see what can be done and if it’s similar to pressure quenching
Exciting stuff because this topological approach is very versatile. Perhaps these same techniques could predict interesting explosive alloying.
Yes it’s only 18 degrees but I am excited to see progress. step by step we’re going to get there, and when we do, it’s going to be world-changing.
18deg looks small next to the absolute value, but an 18deg diff makes it WAY easier to cool.
Put people under enough pressure they will do anything, even conduct themselves better.
What do you prefer :
gigantic pressure and room temperature or
room pressure and near 0K température ?
You can’t have both.
Ok you can ; gigantic pressure and near 0K
It depends on your circumstances, generating the conditions isn’t as hard as isolating them, which makes for interesting thoughts, such as, the possibility of naturally occurring superconducting states out
there somewhere, within the core of planets, etc.
Wasn’t many years ago we had the room temperature hoax… A lot of these ‘breakthroughs’ are really just to get research funding. Haven’t really had much faith since fusion reactors and particle accelerators never ending high dollar research, with very little to show for it. Mostly dreams and fantasy.
This is an incremental improvement, which is how most of science and engineering works. They aren’t claiming anything wild on the face of it, though 18deg is a pretty good step.
They’re getting very close to the point that you can maintain in space with only passive cooling. That’s a big deal, too.
The difference is the research team at Houston has a decent reputation AND the research results have held up over the past 5 months since the news first broke at Houston U. The news here is real. Now with fusion reactors… that’s a different avenue. Honestly, if pressure quenching is applicable to other superconducting material and not just Hg-1223, that could really lead to serious development in the field of superconductivity.
High temperature superconductors are a billion dollar industry with robust growth. The idea that there’s “very little to show for it” is just high comedy.
When I entered physics the dream was to get to liquid nitrogen Tc with significant current capacity. We’ve been there for a while now. This isn’t dreams and fantasy.
Got any proof?
this is excellent because the war with iran and the other war between ukraine and the horrible country has caused the helium shortage to get significantly worse.
Liquid nitrogen cooled superconducting magnets would be nice.
The journal is PNAS, not PNAS Physics, FYI! It is in the Physics section of the journal.