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LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

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Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it hard to make in bulk? I thought the chemicals were easy and cheap to obtain, and then you bake it at a high temp? What makes it difficult?

The variables that lead to its formation are not all accounted for yet. The process is understood, but it doesn’t always work. So there must be something missing every now and then.

So they have a batch of the material as proof, but no idea how to exactly reproduce it?

That would be a wild story if true.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might be excited about ivo quantum drive that is going to be tested in space, NET October

That's a drive with which your exact position becomes uncertain so... you might be there already.

The good old improbability drive.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#453

Saw some people hyping up markets where people are betting on prediction markets whether or not LK-99 will replicate. Can't help but feel like that money would be better spent just paying off some labs to actually try to replicate the process. The response I got from a predictions market enthusiast was that having a sufficiently large market would motivate people to attempt to have the process replicated and buy opti…

Note that real prediction markets with money are currently illegal in the US because of some legacy law. So Polymarket (currently the major prediction market I believe) is only usable outside the US anyway. Currently the only US alternative is play money. Manifold and Metaculus use this system. Metaculus doesn't really use play "money", but a non-zero-sum system to award points for more accurate predictions. It's in…

Kalshi is a real money prediction market that's (only) legal in the US. No market on LK-99 though.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#454
post #38

It is interesting to see how much of the replication is done by the Chinese and how little is done by the Western countries. Is this the difference between the making-stuff-happen attitude and the sclerotic attitude?

The US was a hotbed of scientific quackery at the same time it was developing its leading position in the physical sciences (~hundred plus years ago). So, let's just wait 100 years and see how many of these "replications" are really just fooling themselves (and others).

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like that that website seems to use just smallish penny amounts, no big betting amounts. And that it's a simple formula; if you're right, you win $1 per share, if you lose, you get nothing. There's one about whether Trump wins the election with everyone voting 'no', so the winners will gain fractions of pennies on their bet. But if he does win, those voting 'yes' can gain 99% of their bet.

The concept isn't bad but the problem with these markets isn't necessarily the amounts played, rather it's how they're resolved. What exactly counts as 'event has happened' and 'event has not happened'? I think Polymarket uses some kind of oracle¹ to establish the outcomes. What I know for sure is that there have been a couple of cases of fraudulently set up markets already, so anyone who wants to bet has to really u…

There's been at least one badly mis-resolved market on Polymarket, too.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#456
post #451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The variables that lead to its formation are not all accounted for yet. The process is understood, but it doesn’t always work. So there must be something missing every now and then.

So they have a batch of the material as proof, but no idea how to exactly reproduce it? That would be a wild story if true.

The theory is the crystal structure induced by oxidation and vibration is responsible for the superconducting effect. They literally dropped and cracked the quartz ampoule by accident and produced the sample.

Its not enough to produce the material itself, it seems it is an emergent property of the structure and formation of the material similar to piezoelectric effect?

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#457
post #451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The variables that lead to its formation are not all accounted for yet. The process is understood, but it doesn’t always work. So there must be something missing every now and then.

So they have a batch of the material as proof, but no idea how to exactly reproduce it? That would be a wild story if true.

Not that crazy. Steel was the same at first.

Wild guess is that the dopant that creates wells doesn't always end up where it should. The paper that claimed superconductivity in layers of graphene at very particular angles also seems to be very sensitive. A similar one claimed graphene with alkanes was observed to superconduct. Perhapes whatever impure hydrocarbon they were using held the sheets at the perfect angle. All the quantum wells these things are claiming to rely on seem terribly difficult to arrange perfectly enough to work consistently. Assuming any of them ever did.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#458
post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Type-II super conductors may exhibit "flux pinning". Type-I super conductors do not.

Cool thanks. Gonna read up a little on that. Edit: yea it's interesting. Believe it or not, I studied L-G theory in grad school, taught a lab about (type-II) superconductors, but had no idea that type-I superconductors didn't flux pin. Just leaving this here from Wikipedia: > The superconductor must be a type-II superconductor because type-I superconductors cannot be penetrated by magnetic fields. Some type-I superco…

> If the material's thickness is comparable to the London penetration depth, the magnetic field can pass through the material.

Indeed. A girl I was seeing told me the same once, but obviously things didn't work out between us...

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#459
post #451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The variables that lead to its formation are not all accounted for yet. The process is understood, but it doesn’t always work. So there must be something missing every now and then.

So they have a batch of the material as proof, but no idea how to exactly reproduce it? That would be a wild story if true.

>So they have a batch of the material as proof, but no idea how to exactly reproduce it?

No, we don't know how to reproduce it, with "we" being everyone not on the South Korean team.

The papers everyone is trying to work from to replicate this are the "leaked" arXiv papers. That actual peer reviewed paper is still in process, and presumably that one includes more information on how to replicate the material.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#460

Whether or not this turns out to be real the whole incident has been extremely entertaining, way more than I would have expected. Replication attempts being documented in real time on Twitter and livestreamed on Twitch, news about infighting and drama among the researchers who published the paper, constant fluxations in the betting markets as new news comes out. It's been a wild ride.

It's a lot like the EmDrive incident, except replication attempts are easier. Both are strange discoveries that are poised to change the world as we know it. Hopefully this one turns out, unlike the EmDrive.

or the e-cat: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Catalyzer
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