Since, H. Kamerlingh Onnes in 1911, discovered superconductivity, the phenomenon of conducting electricity with zero resistance. He observed it in Mercury at -269 °Celsius and it’s been over 100 years of experimentation and we are still short of finding a Superconductor at room temperature.
A team of researchers in Germany, have confirmed that one of the most stinking gases that makes the rotten eggs and farts smell, Hydrogen Sulphide (H2S), is the compound that for now holds the record of the Superconductor at the highest temperature which is -70 °Celsius and even though it is 40 °Celsius higher than the previous record of -110 °Celsius, it’s still no use on earth.
The study is done by Mikhail Eremets, Alexander Drozdov and their colleagues at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz, Germany on samples of H2S, hydrogen sulphide°. When they applied around 150 gigapascals (1.5 million atmospheres) and froze H2S at temperatures below 203 °K, the samples exhibited signs of superconductivity, i.e. zero electrical resistance and a phenomenon known as the Meissner effect.
The ability to achieve superconductivity without cooling would not only revolutionise the technologies that already rely on it, such as maglev trains which recently recorded a speed of 603 kmph, MRI machines, and particle accelerators, but suddenly all of our electronic devices would be rendered ultra-efficient. Losing zero energy to resistance without the need for industrial cooling would mean that everything from wind turbines to electrical motors and laptop chargers would require significantly less electricity to run.
Before we get too excited, we have to wait for the results to be replicated by an independent team. A team in Japan has achieved no loss of resistance in pressurised hydrogen sulphide, but have so far seen no signs of the Meissner effect. And three teams in China and one in the US, all of which have been working with hydrogen sulphide, have yet to confirm either
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