Could someone explain why is this world changing?
I read that as an overly conservative cry :D
The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
81–90 of 906 posts
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#82Could someone explain why is this world changing?
Superconductors are basically perfectly conductive wire. Wires that transfer 100% of power over arbitrary distances and that don't heat up. Obviously there are limits, you can't put arbitrary power over a hair thin filament but as long as you're under that limit you get perfect efficiency.
MRI machines can be made a lot simpler as you no longer need to use liquid nitrogen to cool the superconductors. MRI machines could end up being small and cheap.
Perfectly efficient electromagnets make a lot of problems in fusion reactors simpler, I'm not sure that room temperature superconductors make fusion reactors instantly viable but it's a big step and would reduce the energy requirements for a fusion bottle by a lot.
Basically anything involving electromagnets becomes a lot more efficient. Motors can be made smaller, generators can be made much more efficient for the weight, maglev trains can require very little power to hover. It has effects on almost every industrial process as it fundamentally changes the weight and energy efficiency of anything involving electromagnets.
One neat things would be surgical robots that can work as an MRI while also levitating a small blade in a 3D space. Challenging for sure but when you can replace complicated liquid-nitrogen cooled coils with an array of simple passive coils a lot of options open up.
Superconductors can also be used for power storage, and at room temperature that becomes a lot more viable.
Here's this big wikipedia page on applications of superconductivity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_applications_of_...
Also on the less useful side, rail guns.
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#83The graphs on page 3 are exactly what you would expect with a real superconductor. The current/voltage/temp relationship especially. In fact I don't see how you get graphs that look like that unless you either created a superconductor or are just blatantly making up the data. This could be enormous.
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#84If manufacturable at scale, does this allow for MRI machines that could operate without perpetual consumption of liquid helium?
Yes
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#85If manufacturable at scale, does this allow for MRI machines that could operate without perpetual consumption of liquid helium?
As someone who knows more about words than superconductors, gentle correction in case it is an actual misunderstanding instead of misspeaking, but a correctly running MRI shouldn't ever CONSUME the liquid helium, it would recycle as much as possible.
But as a newly self-proclaimed expert on superconductors as well, yeah this would probably help MRIs. My understanding is that the reason for superconductors in MRIs is so that the wires doing the electricity stuff don't interfere with the small electrical responses from the tissue it's measuring. Without resistance, you don't get magnetic fields around the wires or something.
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
Communication satellites only changed the world because they broadcast to mass produced receivers.
Mass produce as many receivers you want and don't launch the ad-hoc satellite. How useful are the receivers?
There is always low range broadcast I suppose.
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#87The Sagan standard is the adage that “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” (a concept abbreviated as ECREE). But one can hope such evidence is forthcoming. And if it is, then short the oil majors.
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#88big if true. far from a chemistry expert here, but synthesis looks basically trivial (if you consider 10e-5 torr vacuum to be trivial), and the materials are readily available. hell, from the instructions alone i could probably make it at home. i mean the search space is unfathomably large, so i suppose it’s possible that something like this exists, but the paper quality itself doesn’t.. spark joy? :) i’ll maintain a…
I've made YBCO superconductors in my garage many times and the solid state synthesis method in the paper is very similar to that used by hobbyists. In fact, it seems to not require the usual careful slow annealing under flowing oxygen. I wouldn't be at all surprised if even simpler methods are feasible. For instance, there's a rapid synthesis method for YBCO that uses a small alumina boat, some glass wool, a resident…
Sounds like you've got a very interesting weekend project coming up!
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#89Could someone explain why is this world changing?
His many devices rely on coduction, how many are thermally limited by efficencies?
Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?
#90If this were true, I would’ve expected to see it on the front page of the New York Times, not hiding in a scientific journal. Color me skeptical, with a hint of optimism.
AFAICT this has not yet been published in a scientific journal, and has not passed peer review of any sort. Having said that, there's been at least one story on HN this past week where researchers were chastised for going to the press before properly vetting their results.
It seems to have been published in a Korean journal: http://journal.kci.go.kr/jkcgct/archive/articleView?artiId=A...