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The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

arxiv.org

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Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#191

Post by foxhill »

lordnacho wrote: post #29
foxhill wrote: post #6

big 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…

You can just make the thing they claim is superconducting? No special requirements? I guess this will be replicated/not pretty soon then.

i expect so. there are some chemistry youtubers who read HN. i’d imagine they’re gonna have a fun few days!

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#192

Post by slashdev »

Paul-Craft wrote: post #163
Maxion wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Superconducting power transmission cables solves the power storage problem of renewable energy sources. We'd just make a global energy grid, and the sunny side powers the dark side.

That won't save us. Not unless you know how to build it in the next 5 years. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36836722

Even if you were right, it behooves us to act as if our actions mattered. Otherwise, what’s the point.

I don’t think you’re right, for the record.

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#193

Post by WanderPanda »

nine_k wrote: post #147
abtinf wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or go long—such a breakthrough would radically increase demand for energy.

Depending on the expense of making the new material, it may become actually feasible to build solar panels across Sahara and feed both Africa and Europe with the electricity generated, because transmission will become lossless and physically compact.

Geopolitically infeasible, look at the mayhem caused by nord stream alone

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#194

Post by giarc »

lordnacho wrote: post #29
foxhill wrote: post #6

big 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…

You can just make the thing they claim is superconducting? No special requirements? I guess this will be replicated/not pretty soon then.

Likely a lot of labs doing it right now.

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#195

Post by MayeulC »

sudosysgen wrote: post #155
mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It probably wouldn't greatly affect the heat generation in a PC, unless the transistors could themselves be replaced with some superconducting alternative. Harnessing the efficiency from that would probably require that the computer be designed as a reversible computer. It would be its own research avenue.

Unfortunately, as soon as you actually use the result of the computation in any kind of practical manner as an output, you break reversibility, though you could make the heat production happen away from the computation.

I don't think you actually need reversibility if you don't discard the energy but return it to the power supply?

In other words, "reversibility", but you can actually pool the useless results together, you don't need to separate them later. Or so I read somewhere...

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#196

Post by slashdev »

amluto wrote: post #157
rwmj wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This (or something derived from it) would be used for power delivery literally everywhere in the world. It might well be bigger in scale and volume than all the computers.

Dunno. A fancy tape or such made out of lead compounds would be a hard sell in comparison to ordinary copper for household wiring. But yes, for serious uses, this will be a big deal if it works out and can be made into a flexible cable. And I’m sure people will work on a less-toxic version.

Losses to resistance inside your home don’t matter much. In your computer they do, but it’s not clear this helps with that.

This would enable really long distance electrical transmission, which solves the whole intermittency issue with solar energy.

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#198

Post by slashdev »

LinAGKar wrote: post #116
slashdev wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d say electronic computers were the biggest invention of the last 100 years. But it wasn’t one discovery, that built upon many, many discoveries and breakthroughs. As a singular discovery goes, it’s hard to think of something that tops this. Of course, even if this is true, bringing it to market in a practical way will probably look a lot more like the invention of electronic computers.

The transistor could probably qualify

Yeah, probably.

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#199

Post by foxhill »

Maxion wrote: post #117
Mizza wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like you've got a very interesting weekend project coming up!

The synthesis section honestly looks very simple, I would assume a simple ceramic kiln could be used? You just need PbO, PbSO4, Cu, and P powders.

kiln materials are listed, too

not that i think it matters that much. the paper doesn’t indicate that synthesis is a particularly sensitive step.

Re: The first room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor?

#200

Post by rotexo »

alsaaro wrote: post #41
slashdev wrote: post #21

This is an unreviewed preprint coming out of South Korea. If it’s reproducible it would be the biggest scientific discovery of the last hundred years. It will literally reshape the world. However, the most likely thing is they made a mistake and the paper will be withdrawn. But imagine if it’s true.

They claim to have observed the Meisner effect, quantum locking unique to superconductors, a pretty big signal, so more likely fraud than a mistake.

Yeah, very probably fraud. Only puzzle is why they would choose something so easy for other labs to try (and fail) to replicate.
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