Salty superconductor champ.Salty superconductor A material that has little resistance to the flow of electricity. Traditional superconductors operate at absolute zero (-459.67 degrees Fahrenheit or -273.15 degrees Celsius). Experiments in the 1980s raised the temperature to -321 degrees Fahrenheit. champ Take a long-named compound known conveniently as ET, combine it with another ingredient and crystallize crys·tal·lize also crys·tal·ize v. crys·tal·lized also crys·tal·ized, crys·tal·liz·ing also crys·tal·iz·ing, crys·tal·liz·es also crys·tal·iz·es v.tr. 1. them. Squeeze the shiny black crystals with 300 atmospheres of pressure while chilling them to temperatures colder than the dark side of Pluto. The results? A new record-breaking organic superconductor In physical chemistry and condensed matter physics, an organic superconductor is an organic compound which exhibits superconductivity at low temperatures. As of 2007 the highest achieved critical temperature for an organic superconductor at standard pressure is 33 Kelvin, observed . In the Sept. 5 INORGANIC CHEMISTRY inorganic chemistry, the study of all the elements and their compounds with the exception of carbon and its compounds, which fall under the category of organic chemistry. , 16 researchers from two national laboratories and North Carolina State University History
The best of the ceramic-oxide superconductors enters a resistance-free state at a relatively cozy 125 kelvins under normal pressure. But chemist Jack M. Williams of Argonne (III.) National Laboratory, who led the ET project, notes that the transition temperatures of new organic superconductors have been rising faster proportionally than those of the ceramic versions. "There's every reason to believe that the organics can have as a high a transition temperature [as the ceramics], or even higher," he says. Salt crystals are made of matched components that donate and acdept electrons. In the record-breaking salt, layers of a chlorine- and copper-containing complex accept electrons from alternating layers of ET, otherwise known as bis(ethylenedithio)tetrathiafulvalene. Williams' team laid claim to the previous organic superconducting record last July with a structurally similar ET salt in which a bromine bromine (brō`mēn, –mĭn) [Gr.,=stench], volatile, liquid chemical element; symbol Br; at. no. 35; at. wt. 79.904; m.p. –7.2°C;; b.p. 58.78°C;; sp. gr. of liquid 3.12 at 20°C;; density of vapor 7. complex, rather than a chlorine complex, serves as the electron acceptor. It superconducts under normal pressure at 11.6 kelvins. University of Tokyo “Todai” redirects here. For the restaurant called Todai, see Todai (restaurant). The University of Tokyo (東京大学 researchers had previously reported making a related salt with a transition temperature of 11.4 kelvins. Researchers continue to mix and match different donors and accepters in the push for higher transition temperatures. Because the resulting salts typically have about one-seventh the density of ceramic superconductors, they would be well suited for use in spacecraft and other devices requiring lightweight materials, Williams says. |
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