Turn up the temperature

摘要

A more elaborate picture is developing of what makes some materials superconduct at relatively high temperatures. With it come hints for how to design materials with still higher transition temperatures. Discovered a hundred years ago, superconductivity describes the flow of electric current without resistance in metals. Most metals do not become superconducting until cooled to within about ten degrees of absolute zero. But the discovery, in 1987, of materials that become superconducting at much higher temperatures rekindled an old dream that one day room-temperature superconductivity might be achieved.