The future will have superconductors operating under room temperature conditions

Scientists found that H2S (hydrogen sulfide), a gas compound under normal, very toxic and rotten egg odor, becomes a superconductor when it lowers its temperature to -70 ° C (203 ° K). A temperature of -70 ° C is much warmer than other superconductors that require lowering the temperature to minus hundreds of degrees Celsius. This report was published in the Nature journal.

Using hydrogen sulfide (H2S) as a superconductor, the future may be superconducting at room temperature

This puts a historic step towards a way to find a superconductor that works right in room temperature conditions. It makes the scientists studying this project very excited.

Illustration: Superconductors at negative temperatures can be used to lift other objects.

Since superconductors now need to be supercooled to work, which is a condition that no ordinary person can achieve, making superconductors operating at room temperature will make devices Power is now more efficiently transmitted, which is also a boost to creating giant magnets used in medical cameras. In an article in Nature, Igor Mazin of the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, DC described how finding H2S's superconductivity is like finding a "holy grail of superconductors" . Physicist Fan Zhang of the University of Texas, Dallas also agrees with this idea, saying it is a milestone and will go a lot further.

Molecular structure of hydrogen sulfide

This is the research result of Mikhail Eremets, Alexanders Drozdov and colleagues at the Max Planck Institute of Chemistry in Mainz, Germany. The scientists hypothesized that when compressing hydrogen sulfide at extreme pressure, about 1.5 million atmospheres (150 giga pascal) simultaneously lowered their temperature to minus 70 ° C (203 degrees Kelvin), currently Superconductivity will occur: H2S has no resistance and Meissner effect. Meissner is a phenomenon that occurs when superconducting material is placed in a magnetic field while inside it has no magnetic field. In fact, the Meissner effect is to place a metal object on the surface of a superconducting material that will hover.

Other scientists are all excited about the finding, according to them, finding the superconductivity of H2S leads to the ability to use superconducting materials without the copper-containing compound (called cuprates). superconductivity is about - 140 ° C at normal pressure and - 109 ° C at high pressure. However, for science, Eremets and colleagues' theory is still inaccurate until specific experiments are conducted. Must wait until they experiment with H2S and confirm that the Meissner effect has occurred.

Meissner phenomenon.Lexus Hoverboard skis also works on this principle

If Eremets and colleagues' theory is correct, hydrogen compounds will become new candidates for superconducting . For example, the researchers theorized that in addition to H2S there is a compound between hydrogen and platinum, hydrogen with potassium, hydrogen with selenium or tellurium, instead of sulfur.

Dr. Zhang from Dallas University and Yugui Yao at Beijing Science Institute said that replacing 7.5% sulfur in H2S compounds with phosphorus and lifting pressure to 2.5 million atmosphere (250 giga pascal) We can create superconductivity at 280K, which is equivalent to 6.85 ° C, ie even without cooling the compound to a negative temperature.