Breakthrough in high-temp superconductivity

PORTLAND, USA: Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, located in and Knoxville, Tennessee, the United States, say they have found evidence that high-temperature superconductivity derives from the same mechanisms irrespective of materials.

This has given rise to speculation that magnetic spin excitations, which couple electrons, are the key component for superconductivity.

The spin excitations that the researchers conducted on a superconducting material at Oak Ridge National Laboratory support the theory that magnetic properties cause high-temperature superconductivity.

According to Mark Lumsden, lead researcher, magnetic interactions provide the ‘glue’ that binds the electrons together, The pairing up of electrons, Lumsden says, is crucial for the formation of the macroscopic quantum state that gives rise to superconductivity.

High-temperature superconductivity, say the researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, could lead to ultra-fast electronic devices which make use of high-speed electrons that travel in a material, the resistance of which has been reduced to zero.

Ultra-sensitive sensors (called superconducting quantum interference devices), nuclear magnetic resonance imaging, and levitating trains use superconductors.

In 2009, researchers in Japan had found out a new type of high-temperature superconducting material that is based on iron. Other high-temperature superconductors are based on copper.

Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory now claim that, if magnetism explains copper high-temperature superconductors, then it would also explain superconductors based on iron.