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A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

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Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#51

Post by Geee »

N1H1L wrote: post #47
digdugdirk wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a conductor of electricity. But super good at it. i.e. - It has zero resistance to electricity. Currently, the best superconducting materials we can create have to be chilled to near absolute zero, which means designing them to work in liquid helium baths. This is expensive, and difficult. If a material can superconduct at room temperature, now we're talking usage in general purpose consumer goods. As for why we…

They are also very good energy storage media. Combine that with zero transmission losses - you can now highly efficient EV powertrains that are significantly more compact. 1000 mile EVs become actually viable. Secondly, superconductors are one of the most promising platforms for qubits. Big boost for quantum computing - and these are just two applications off the top off my head.

Can you point to a source of these superconducting energy storage mechanisms? How do they work? I briefly looked into it and found out that at least the current ones have very high power density, but low energy density.

Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#52

Post by Ancapistani »

fallingknife wrote: post #49
7moritz7 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen three now from China alone. Plus a calculation from some respected institute from today that confirms the theory

Why are they all from China? Why are they able to replicate so much faster than US labs?

They have a lot of labs, and materials sourcing is easier for them. That’s partially because China is the origin of lots of stuff, and partly because the US regulated red phosphorus as a meth precursor.

Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#53

Post by ta1243 »

fallingknife wrote: post #49
7moritz7 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen three now from China alone. Plus a calculation from some respected institute from today that confirms the theory

Why are they all from China? Why are they able to replicate so much faster than US labs?

Everyone with half a brain in the US is working the ad-tech and data-mining industries, that's where the money is.

Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#54

Post by martinald »

digdugdirk wrote: post #25
Ajay-p wrote: post #19

I still have a very, very hard time understanding what all of this means. Is there an easy to understand explanation for a room temperature superconductor?

It's a conductor of electricity. But super good at it. i.e. - It has zero resistance to electricity. Currently, the best superconducting materials we can create have to be chilled to near absolute zero, which means designing them to work in liquid helium baths. This is expensive, and difficult. If a material can superconduct at room temperature, now we're talking usage in general purpose consumer goods. As for why we…

Hmm. Losses from HVDC transmission are on the order of 3% per 1000km, so I'm not sure how much of a big deal it'd be for that kind of use case. Your example would only save ~6% transmission losses. An improvement yes but not really a big deal, unless the cables were far cheaper to make than current HVDC cables (which I'm doubtful about).

I think there are other use cases within devices themselves that are far more interesting for energy storage.

Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#55

Post by declan_roberts »

fallingknife wrote: post #49
7moritz7 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen three now from China alone. Plus a calculation from some respected institute from today that confirms the theory

Why are they all from China? Why are they able to replicate so much faster than US labs?

One limitation here is the required materials, which are likely much easier to get in China. At least one of the materials is a controlled substance by the DEA in the USA.

Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#56

Post by ssijak »

mmh0000 wrote: post #41
anyoneamous wrote: post #30

Mostly, I am just glad that all the LK-99 posts are drowning out the "AI" news for a few days.

But fear the news if it is discovered that LK-99 increases AI performance.

Imagine NVIDIA superconducting chips made for AI

Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#57

Post by pjmorris »

mmh0000 wrote: post #41
anyoneamous wrote: post #30

Mostly, I am just glad that all the LK-99 posts are drowning out the "AI" news for a few days.

But fear the news if it is discovered that LK-99 increases AI performance.

Or the news that ChatGPT is attempting an LK-99 replication.

Re: A room-temperature superconductor? New developments

#60

Post by russellbeattie »

I wonder if this is just summertime boredom combined with social media blowing an interesting development out of proportion, or if we're actually witnessing history in real time?

Also, what are the chances this is like another graphene, where it can do everything except get out of the lab?

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