Scientists Create Room Temperature Superconductor (no, not exactly)
March 21st, 2008
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I nearly fell off my chair when I saw this post on Slashdot which claimed that scientists had created a superconductor that works at room temperature. This has been something of a holy grail for materials scientists since conventional superconductors need to be cooled to near absolute zero with liquid helium and even the newer “high temperature superconductor” operate at temperatures which require liquid nitrogen cooling.
As it turns out the new hydrogen-silicon based material which was tested did need supercooling however the researchers hope that this development could potentially lead to future room-temperature superconductors. There’s another big catch and that is that it requires enormous pressure to operate. This is still a noteworthy development in the pursuit of better methods of manufacturing and employing superconductors, but it’s not nearly as exciting as it first seemed.
Superconductors offer effectively zero resistance to electricity and therefore can be used for highly effecient transmission of power as well as energy storage and creating extremely effecient and powerful magnets. For this reason they’re commonly used in MRI machines, particle accelerators and other applications that demand extremely powerful magnetic fields. They also have been used in electrical transmission but only to a limited extent due to the cooling required.
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March 21st, 2008 at 10:33 am
On 21 July, 1983, the Vostok Research Station in Antarctica logged the coldest temperature ever measured on earth at -89.2 C. This is equivalent to 183.95 Kelvin. On March 6, 2008, Joe Eck measured signs of superconductivity just over 185 Kelvin in an optimized tin-lead-indium-barium-thulium-copper compound, marking the first observation of superconductivity at earth ambient temperatures. Eight separate tests of the compound (Sn1.0Pb0.5In0.5)Ba4Tm5Cu7O20+ produced an average Tc of 185.6K.
So technically we have arrived.
SEE: The First Ambient Temperature Superconductor for details.
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March 21st, 2008 at 11:05 am
That is interesting because 185 kelvin is not that difficult to produce with conventional vapor-phase refrigeration techniques. It would require some kind of multi-stage cooling or something but I mean it’s doable on a relatively easy system.
So the question then is is this superconducting material the kind of thing which could ever be produced in any quantity for general use or is it just limited to small batches in the laboratory or very expensive? it sounds like it’s a complicated compound.
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March 21st, 2008 at 11:21 am
There was no mention of its other properties which would determine just how practical it might be.
As for its complexity it is really not that different from many high performance alloys. For example look at greek ascoloy, a very popular high performance martensitic alloy used in many engineering applications. Its make up is 0.15/0.20 C, 0.50 Mn, 0.50 Si, 0.03 P, 0.03 S, 12.00/14.00 Cr, 1.80/2.20 Ni, 0.50 Mo, 2.50/3.50 W, Bal. Fe.
This material is not that special, there are many like it and many that are more complex.
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March 21st, 2008 at 11:53 am
Then there’s also the proposal (and I believe some installed pilot installations) to use HT superconducting underground cables for transmission of electricity AND liquid hydrogen. The cryo-H2 acts as cooling agent AND energy transport/storage medium for peaker plants at the power destination.
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March 21st, 2008 at 12:02 pm
These projects are hosted by electric utility companies in Albany, New York; Columbus, Ohio; and Long Island, New York. Two of the cables have been installed and are waiting to be energized while the third is scheduled to be energized in mid 2007.
A team led by American Superconductor will build and demonstrate a power cable on Long Island that will connect two Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) substations nearly half a mile apart. The 138 kV cable will be the first ever application of an HTS cable in the utility grid at transmission voltages. A team led by SuperPower is demonstrating a 350meter, 34.5 kV HTS cable connecting two National Grid Company substations, along the Hudson River in Albany, New York.
ULTERA (a partnership between Southwire and NKT cables) is leading the development of a 200-meter, 13.2 kV HTS cable that has been installed in a substation in the American Electric Power grid in Columbus, Ohio. The cable is designed to carry 3,000 amps of current
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March 21st, 2008 at 12:19 pm
I have a question about this: If there materials which can achieve superconductivity with liquid nitrogen temperatures why is it that MRI machines and accelerators and other applications use liquid helium? I’ve heard of liquid helium being used and I think it still is used in these applications but if LN2 could do the job for some superconductors, why not use those? LN2 seems like it would be a lot easier/cheaper than LHe
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March 21st, 2008 at 2:36 pm
Liquid nitrogen is less expensive, dry ice would be even cheaper, and that’s below the Tc of these new superconductors. However a superconducting material is not necessarily an engineering material. The ones that can be used in practical applications haven’t reached these high temperatures as of yet, and that’s why liquid helium continues to be used.
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March 21st, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Dave G:
A lot more materials become superconducting at the lower temperature of liquid helium. Liquid helium has a boiling point at 4 Kelvin. LN2 has a boiling point between 63-73 Kelvin. LN2 is a lot cheaper and easier to produce, so the goal of a lot of the metalurgical superconducting research is to use LN2.
Researchers at NIST developed a way to cool things down to the milliKelvin range (e.g. 0.1 K) using an adiabatic demagnitization refrigerator, but they start with liquid helium to get the initial temperature down. In the milliKelvin range, a ton of materials become superconducting. I read an article where they are using plain tin as the superconducting material. If you are interested, I’ll point you to some articles.
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March 21st, 2008 at 5:12 pm
It is a fascinating area of research which is quite exciting in that it has such potential in a number of areas. As we get better at creating superconductors and also cooling methods that allow more materials to be used, the potential for revolutionary changes in energy transmission and storage as well as magnetic applications is just enormous.
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March 21st, 2008 at 7:11 pm
Definately interesting and exciting. Question for Larry: That sounds really interesting but if you have to start off with liquid helium and then use specialized refrigeration and possibly a real real lot of energy then does it have the potential for use beyond a few applications?
I mean it might have potential but if it’s the kind of thing that needs to have several rooms of compressors and transformers and storage tanks and stuff and a few dozen engineers to keep it operating then it might not ever be something that goes beyond a couple government laboratories and maybe a few institutions like MIT, you know?
Do you think that kind of cooling has the potential for coming to a computer near me, or even industrial use or is this going to be on the scale and complexity of the Space Shuttle?
That’s my big question, because it’s not always what can be done but what can be done on a managable scale and with a managable amount of engineering and fabrication.
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March 21st, 2008 at 8:15 pm
I don’t know, but I would not underestimate the ability of complex technology to be developed to the point of being reasonable for end use and not just mega-funded government institutions with dozens of staff to keep it going.
Think about MRI machines, for example. They need liquid helium and a special insulated chamber for it plus compressors to keep rechilling it. All that chryo technology and stuff plus precision magnetics. It was national-laboratory level decades ago but now look: Every good sized hospital has one if not two and even small clinics have them. The system is not exactly affortable for the individual, but you need to consider that they were able to make it totally managable and cost-effective for medium sized medical operations.
Why not other superconductor use? For industry? Maybe power transmission?
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March 22nd, 2008 at 6:32 pm
Q:
I saw a presentation for a new radiation detector (I do radiation safety stuff) that uses this technology. The spectrums it produces beat present technologies by at least 10-100 fold.
The following website shows a picture of the cryo-unit. It’s the gold colored device in the upper left corner of the picture. I was quite surprised at its small size. As Dave says, I expect (and hope that I live long enough) to see this application scaled to all sorts of things. When they get around to it, I predict it will be another revolutionary leap for the medical imaging industry, much like MRI, CT and PET imaging have been revolutionary. I’m not sure if it has application to the power industry, but who knows?
http://www.eeel.nist.gov/817/news/headlinenews.html
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March 22nd, 2008 at 7:47 pm
I really don’t know about this, Larry. I happen to have formed a very close attachment to my Pri-111B De Lux Scintillator.
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March 22nd, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Ok, now I have to google that because I feel like I’m left out of an inside joke.
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March 22nd, 2008 at 10:04 pm
apparently it is an old radiation detector which still has a following. Also it seems to look like a ray gun or maybe a hairdryer.
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March 22nd, 2008 at 10:17 pm
As featured on the video Depleted Uranium for Dinner
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March 23rd, 2008 at 4:37 pm
How about power generation, via good old fashioned magnetic-containment *hot* fusion, since it’s that much more feasible
to bring the resistance of the solenoid wire down to zero and keep it there.
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March 24th, 2008 at 8:14 am
Well that would be nice. I think MCF right now a big expenditure in energy is keeping the superconductors they do use cool. I don’t think it’s so easy to insulate and cool the big magnets when they’re right next to a big old doughnut of plasma. It might be helpful if they could do it at higher temperatures with less cooling expenditure.
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March 10th, 2009 at 3:33 am
RBR1978 said:
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March 10th, 2009 at 3:50 am
have you heard about the chemist in puyallup wa discovered and patented a formula to predict whthin 1% what temp a superconductor will operate.so in the mixing of elements & compounds and such this formula takes all the trial and error out of the game.and should help the physical community advance the making of a room temp ,wire ,The shame of tis whole story is this is my father im talking about ,and this was his work in his last 12 years of his life he just passed away 3 days befoe his patent arrived,but he knew it was issued ,and that gave him great comfort.we as a family dont know what to do with it know,my fathe has over 42 patents,ranging from,1 of the first magnetic heads that took computers from room size to desk size,he also had a patent on a golf ball called the POLORA that whet straight no matter how you hit it.so if their anybody with some good suggestions let me know GOOGLE MY DAD Daniel Nepela
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January 7th, 2010 at 1:37 pm
Hi Keith, Sorry to hear about your Dad – he and I were friends in our IBM days. He had a great mind, an interesting perspective on life, and made me laugh (a lot!). What was he doing in WA? May I ask how old was he when he died?
Good luck to you! Joel
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January 15th, 2010 at 4:51 pm
hi Joel my father Daniel Nepela moved up to wash to work on his patent,he died jan 24th 2009 he new his patent was on the way and came in the mail 3 or 4 days after he passed,he still had his great outlook on life till the last moments. I sure wish people knew just what a great mind for problem solving he had, and just how important some of his inventions are , He should be the one to win the next Nobel prize in my and many others opinions. his patent Superconductor Compositions predictable @ high tempratures. is just that ,it predicts what temp that the compounds & elements chosen will operate at. this should take a lot of guess work out of inventing the next generation of superconductive applications.for a wide variety of applications.he did not invent a widget he invented the formula to invent the widget ect,so I hope the scientific community see’s this for what it is a formula to assist the future development of superconductive wires that operate at room temp. thanks for the note Joel I will mention this to my mom
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