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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?

#681

Post by forgetfreeman »

paulddraper wrote: post #653
Turskarama wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but the point is that they hardly caused a revolution in energy storage. If fuel cells didn't exist, for the average person life would be exactly the same. Revolutionary tech does change normal peoples lives, and sometimes very rapidly, but a lot of stuff that looks revolutionary just kind of never works out. I'd say nuclear power is probably the prime example of this. It was supposed to bring us electricity to…

> It was supposed to bring us electricity too cheap to meter, but it's actually the most expensive form of generation that anyone bothers to build. That's not a technical issue though. Cost efficiency of nuclear energy has actually declined over time...which, unless science is devolving, should tell you something hinky is happening.

coughlong term waste storage and cleanupcough

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

#682

Post by pezezin »

techdragon wrote: post #643
nick__m wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I apologize, I couldn't not resist to the occasion of being technically correct. I should also have stated that a superconductors based CPU would be incredibly cool figuratively and physically!

While a room temperature superconductor would potentially have some uses in building a CPU… it’s not as relevant as you might think due to the semiconductor being the operating physics at play to make the transistors and perform the electrical switching and everything stemming from that underlying electrical unit. You could absolutely use superconductors for all the connecting wires, and with a little engineering it…

I found a Wikipedia article about the topic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superconducting_computing

Turns out that some research groups have already built superconducting CPU, albeit tiny ones.

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

#683

Post by lilgreenland »

achr2 wrote: post #592
lilgreenland wrote: post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

well that one looks great. Maybe in the original video a superconductive effect was there, but not strong enough to frame lock. But you can see it in the newer video.

The new video doesn't show anything convincing either - Pyrolytic graphite behaves the same way at room temps due to strong diamagnetism.

hmmm. This is what you are talking about. https://youtu.be/TlD12QObooc?t=420

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

#684

Post by XorNot »

Jweb_Guru wrote: post #673
XorNot wrote: post #664

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main worry is whether we're dealing with wholly rational actors. People convince themselves they're seeing an effect, and then seemingly completely erratic things to try and prove it on the conviction that with just a bit more effort they'll get it for real. Like you'd question why someone would photoshop results[1] in a paper, because surely they'd have to realize they're fabricating data, but they go ahead and…

I will say this, I haven't found the "it's not real" responses very compelling either. I've also found that people who actually work in the field seem less skeptical than knowledgeable people adjacent to the field. If it's not fraud, it's at least something new. Here are the reasons I've seen provided by adjacent folks: Nonscientific objections: * it was published in a low h-index journal (not a scientific objection)…

The trouble with the shown videos is that with a limited perspective, they do look a lot like the sort of single-camera trick that a lot of "free energy" device videos use - e.g. [1]

Fortunately if we're dealing with a real effect, this will be easily replicated and proven. But with the fixed perspective of a video, you can create a large number of apparent effects that look real in the constraints of the video format.

The biggest point in favor is that there's full reproduction instructions. I am eagerly waiting someone to try and pull this together separately.

Where I get hung up is, it's an extraordinary, world-changing claim. The standard of proof is very high (and while I could get access to a kiln, I can't get access to high pressure vacuum vessel on short notice).

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnOo8jwCEJM

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

#685

Post by carabiner »

015a wrote: post #677

> we succeeded in synthesizing the room-temperature superconductor (Tc≥400 K, 127∘C) I'll say, for "room temperature", that's certainly no room I'd want to be in.

No, the video shows them manipulating the superconductor with their hands in thin gloves.

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

#686

Post by concurrentsquar »

swagmoney1606 wrote: post #207
eig wrote: post #179

A sister paper [0] has a photo of the material exhibiting the Meisner effect and levitating over a magnet, and claims to have a video too. Either they blatantly photoshopped the photo or they actually made a room temperature super conductor. I can’t see how the could have made a subtle mistake that resulted in magnetic levitation at room temp without making a superconductor. [0] - https://arxiv.org/abs/2307.12037

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtVjGWpbE7k I really need someone to bring me down a notch. This is too exciting!

> I really need someone to bring me down a notch. This is too exciting!

It's on arXiv, which is a preprint journal, which means it has no peer-review; and is therefore generally less trustworthy (especially when the paper has no connection to a technical conference or is not being published elsewhere, and is in a non-computer science or mathematics field).

In addition to this, claims of room-temperature superconductors have been mired in controversy or otherwise proven false:

- http://www.superconductors.org/roomnano.htm (2004)

- https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2012.11443 (2012)

- https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-superconductor-... (2018)

- https://www.quantamagazine.org/room-temperature-superconduct... (2020)

- https://forbetterscience.com/2023/03/29/superconductive-frau... (2022-2023)

Considering that many fraudulent claims of room-temperature superconductivity have gotten into Nature and other top-tier publications, I would wait for multiple independent recreations of the results in the paper.

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

#687

Post by pezezin »

tomxor wrote: post #590
pezezin wrote: post #555

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that modern CMOS circuits dissipate around 1 pJ (10^-12) per bit, so even if we are limited by the Landauer's principle, it would still be a 9 orders of magnitude improvement. I would surely love a CPU that uses microwatts instead of hundreds of watts.

Yup, the current dominating factor is resistance, not the Landauer limit. Biological systems supposedly operate at about one order of magnitude above the Landauer limit [0], i.e this is completely practical and has been happening before we even made computers... we probably wouldn't exist without being this efficient, imagine how much energy our cells would need to consume and emit as heat if it were similar to a CPU…

Really interesting paper, thank you for the link.

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

#688

Post by segfaultbuserr »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #363
amatecha wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more about producing toxic waste and contaminating the environment - no one's licking the solder joints in their electronics either, but you still have to use lead-free solder. For instance in EU, https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A... Canada, https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/environmenta... USA, https://www.epa.gov/lead/learn-about-lead

> more about producing toxic waste Compared to refining traditional conductors and recycling/disposing of used electronics? > you still have to use lead-free solder One, fumes. Two, people touch their solder and then grab a cookie. We're premature. The results need to be proven. But the benefits of RTP superconductors is mindblowingly high enough that risks from lead contamination (far from a novel problem, I might a…

> One, fumes.

It's trivial to experimentally demonstrate that solder fume contains almost no lead, the quantity is negligible. Claiming the contrary is the electronics equivalent of saying HTML is a programming language. Please don't do that again. The fume is indeed toxic, but it's due to the VOCs from the flux core, not the lead in the alloy.

A more solid (no pun intended) argument can be the hazards of debris. Furthermore, in my opinion, a newer and more serious problem of leaded solder today, in a workshop setting, is its use in solder paste. Solder paste and a reflow oven are required for prototyping any circuit boards with surface-mount components (SMT) - basically any modern circuit board today. Solder paste is a tube of toothpaste-like chemical mixture that contains tiny, micrometer-sized metal particles, mixed with sticky flux. If they're used without care, a solder paste spill is a sure way to contaminate the floor or work surface of your workspace. The sticky paste is also hard to wash away from skin.

Unfortunately, reflow soldering of surface-mount components can be really challenging, even more so when doing it by hand. Thus, classic lead-tin alloy is often used to reduce difficulties of assembly during workshop prototyping due to its technically superior properties. Switching to lead-free is only possible when you have a tightly-controlled and consistent work flow.

If you want lead-free, for small-scale prototyping and rework, a non-toxic bismuth-tin alloy is sometimes a good alternative to standard SAC305 lead-free solder thanks to its low melting temperature, which is one main reason that makes most lead-free alloys difficult to use (it even has considerable popularity in mass production of LED devices, as they are heat-sensitive). But its surface tension is slightly different, weakening the self-alignment effect of components during reflow soldering, increasing the chance of defective joints - a concern in prototyping. Its brittle nature also increases failure rates in the field, among other caveats.

Lead is really a gift from the devil.

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

#689

Post by klodolph »

justahuman74 wrote: post #680
techdragon wrote: post #629

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it’s been a pretty solid trend line, new superconductor, first batch is usually kinda shitty, but proves the basics, refining the mix nails down its exact performance characteristics. It’s spongy grainy crap indeed… but as long as their analysis holds up to scrutiny and replication… and whoa boy do I bet there are people already trying to replicate this result as I’m typing my reply and reading the rest of the…

As someone who doesn't follow superconductors, what sorts of things about life/engineering/society would change, how dramatic would it be, and more importantly: which stocks would you pick :)

The direct impact could be relatively limited, at least for a while. Having a room-temperature superconductor is really awesome, but existing high-temperature superconductors are fragile and expensive. You can make motors, electromagnets, and power grids with much better efficiency—but that’s not so useful if the parts break when you look at them wrong.

You’ll still get better magnets and sensors, probably. Maybe even get new types of circuitry.

Just for comparison—we use silicon for integrated circuits. Not because it has the best performance, but because it’s convenient, it’s readily available, silicon dioxide is a good insulator, etc.

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

#690

Post by syncsynchalt »

malnourish wrote: post #365
refulgentis wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand, I assume it's a dialogue? What is the meaning of the punchline being Celsius? Does the first sentence intend to include "room-temperature"?

The punchline is the temperature was originally presumed to be Kelvin.

Though a _real_ stickler of a scientist knows that K is not given in degrees and would have lightly chastised if making that assumption.

I still enjoyed the joke though.

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