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Superconductor breakthrough replicated twice on preliminary testing
(www.tomshardware.com)
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this post was submitted on 02 Aug 2023
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A superconductor would completely change how we handle electricity. It’s like a cheat code almost. I’d say most of our current electric infrastructure only exists because of the limitations of our non-superconducting materials.
Keep in mind that superconductors have a critical current below which you have to be if you want to stay in the superconductive states. So for a superconductor to be useful for energy transport, this current has to not be tiny. I haven’t had the time to read their paper so I don’t know the value of the critical current. Also if for some reason the current suddenly goes beyond the critical current, the wire will heat suddenly, with possible damage…
I didn’t know that. Thanks.
And sometimes superconducting materials are wholly impractical -- making it superconductive could make it incredibly brittle, etc. Supposedly this new material is an "apatite", which is a geological term for a kind of crystal. Who knows what properties it has, yet? Supposedly these samples were made and tested by depositing them on to a glass surface.