Super Conductivity: current carriers.

As a negatively-
charged electron moves through the
Superconductivity is a phenomenon space between two rows of positively-
observed in several metals and ceramic charged atoms, it pulls inward on the
materials. When these materials are atoms of the lattice. This distortion
cooled to temperatures ranging from attracts a second electron to move in
near absolute zero ( 0 degrees Kelvin, behind it.
-273 degrees Celsius) to liquid nitrogen
temperatures ( 77 K, -196 C), their An electron in the lattice can interact
electrical resistance drops with a jump with another electron by exchanging an
down to zero. acoustic quanta called phonon. Phonons
in acoustics are analogous to photons in
electromagnetic. The energy of a phonon
is usually less than 0.1 eV (electron-volt)
and thus is one or two orders of
magnitude less than that of a photon.

Properties of Super-Conductors:

Why Some materials are called super-

conductors: The two electrons form a weak
attraction, travel together in a pair and
encounter less resistance overall. In a
Electrical resistance in metals arises superconductor, electron pairs are
because electrons moving through the constantly forming, breaking and
metal are scattered due to deviations reforming, but the overall effect is that
from translational symmetry. These are electrons flow with little or no
produced either by impurities, giving resistance. The current is carried then
raise to a temperature independent by electrons moving in pairs called
contribution to the resistance, or by the Cooper pairs.
vibrations of the lattice in the metal.
A Cooper Pair moving through the
lattice

In a superconductor below its critical

temperature, there is no resistance
because these scattering mechanisms are
unable to impede the motion of the
 The classic demonstration of the
Meissner Effect.

The second electron encounters less

resistance, much like a passenger car
following a truck on the motorway
encounters less air resistance.
A superconductive disk on the bottom,
Below the critical temperature these cooled by liquid nitrogen, causes the
superconducting materials have no magnet above to levitate. The floating
electrical resistance and so they can magnet induces a current, and therefore a
carry large amounts of electrical current magnetic field, in the superconductor,
for long periods of time without loosing and the two magnetic fields repel to
energy as ohmic heat. For example, levitate the magnet.
loops of superconducting wire have been
shown to carry electrical currents for This property has implications for
several years with no measurable loss. making high speed, magnetically-
This property offers tremendous levitated trains, for making powerful,
challenges and opportunities in the small, superconducting magnets for
modern world. magnetic resonance imaging, etc.
MEISSNER EFFECT JOSEPHSON EFFECT
Another property of superconducting One other property of superconductors is
materials is the Meissner Effect. It was that when two of them are joined by a
observed that as a magnet is brought thin, insulating layer, it is easier for the
near a superconductor, the magnet electron pairs to pass from one
encounters a repulsive force. It can be superconductor to another without
said that the superconductor completely resistance . This is called the Josephson
expels the magnetic field and behaves as Effect. This effect has implications for
a perfect diamagnet. superfast electrical switches that can be
used to make small, high-speed
computers.

SPECIFIC HEAT
In a superconducting phase transition, Kelvin respectively. However, only a
the electric resistance changes with a proportion of the Helium becomes
jump, while the energy undergoes a superfluid at the transition temperature.
continuous variation. The specific heat,
or the amount of heat necessary to affect
its temperature, also changes with a
jump. When a substance is cooled, its
specific heat typically decreases but at
the critical temperature it increases
suddenly.

SUPERFLUIDITY

This phenomenon was first observed in

helium at a temperature below 2.17K.
Helium at these low temperatures was
seen to flow quite freely, without any
friction, through any gaps and even
through very thin capillary tubes. Once
set in circular motion, for example, it
will keep on flowing forever - if there
are no external forces acting upon it. This free movement of helium at a
Unlike all other chemical elements temperature below 2.17K looks very
helium does not solidify when cooled much like the superconductivity
down near absolute zero. Physicists behaviour mentioned above. To explain
explain this phenomenon by extremely this frictionless motion, we can imagine
weak attractive forces between the that all the particles in the liquid are
almost "perfectly round" atoms and by linked together and none of them can be
their rapid motion which is due to separated, without violating the whole
Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle state.
Bulk superfluid helium has many
unusual properties - it can flow up walls
and through narrow pores without
resistance. Helium-4 and Helium-3
become superfluid below 2.12 and 0.003
History of Super Conductors:

Superconductors, materials that have no levitated over a superconductive

resistance to the flow of electricity, are material.
one of the last great frontiers of scientific In subsequent decades other
discovery. Not only have the limits of superconducting metals, alloys and
superconductivity not yet been reached, compounds were discovered. In 1941
but the theories that explain niobium-nitride was found to
superconductor behavior seem to be superconduct at 16 K. In 1953
constantly under review. In 1911 vanadium-silicon displayed
superconductivity was first observed in superconductive properties at 17.5 K.
mercury by Dutch physicist Heike And, in 1962 scientists at Westinghouse
Kamerlingh Onnes of Leiden University developed the first commercial
(shown above). When he cooled it to the superconducting wire, an alloy of
temperature of liquid helium, 4 degrees niobium and titanium (NbTi). High-
Kelvin (-452F, -269C), its resistance energy, particle-accelerator
suddenly disappeared. The Kelvin scale electromagnets made of copper-clad
represents an “absolute” scale of niobium-titanium were then developed
temperature. Thus, it was necessary for in the 1960s at the Rutherford-Appleton
Onnes to come within 4 degrees of the Laboratory in the UK, and were first
coldest temperature that is theoretically employed in a superconducting
attainable to witness the phenomenon of accelerator at the Fermilab Tevatron in
superconductivity. Later, in 1913, he the US in 1987.
won a Nobel Prize in physics for his
research in this area. The first widely-accepted theoretical
understanding of superconductivity was
The next great milestone in advanced in 1957 by American
understanding how matter behaves at physicists John Bardeen, Leon Cooper,
extreme cold temperatures occurred in and John Schrieffer (above). Their
1933. German researchers Walter Theories of Superconductivity became
Meissner (above) and Robert Ochsenfeld know as the BCS theory - derived from
discovered that a superconducting the first letter of each man’s last name -
material will repel a magnetic field and won them a Nobel prize in 1972.
(below graphic). A magnet moving by a The mathematically-complex BCS
conductor induces currents in the theory explained superconductivity at
conductor. This is the principle on which temperatures close to absolute zero for
the electric generator operates. But, in a elements and simple alloys. However, at
superconductor the induced currents higher temperatures and with different
exactly mirror the field that would have superconductor systems, the BCS theory
otherwise penetrated the has subsequently become inadequate to
superconducting material - causing the fully explain how superconductivity is
magnet to be repulsed. This phenomenon occurring.
is known as strong diamagnetism and is
today often referred to as the “Meissner Another significant theoretical
effect” (an eponym). The Meissner effect advancement came in 1962 when Brian
is so strong that a magnet can actually be D. Josephson (above), a graduate student
at Cambridge University, predicted that
electrical current would flow between 2 superconductor candidates. The
superconducting materials - even when Lanthanum, Barium, Copper and
they are separated by a non- Oxygen compound that Müller and
superconductor or insulator. His Bednorz synthesized, behaved in a not-
prediction was later confirmed and won as-yet-understood way. (Original article
him a share of the 1973 Nobel Prize in printed in Zeitschrift für Physik
Physics. This tunneling phenomenon is Condensed Matter, April 1986.) The
today known as the “Josephson effect” discovery of this first of the
and has been applied to electronic superconducting copper-oxides
devices such as the SQUID, an (cuprates) won the 2 men a Nobel Prize
instrument capabable of detecting even the following year. It was later found
the weakest magnetic fields. (Below that tiny amounts of this material were
SQUID graphic courtesy Quantum actually superconducting at 58 K, due to
Design.) a small amount of lead having been
added as a calibration standard - making
The 1980’s were a decade of unrivaled
the discovery even more noteworthy.
discovery in the field of
superconductivity. In 1964 Bill Little of
Stanford University had suggested the Müller and Bednorz’ discovery triggered
possibility of organic (carbon-based) a flurry of activity in the field of
superconductors. The first of these superconductivity. Researchers around
theoretical superconductors was the world began “cooking” up ceramics
successfully synthesized in 1980 by of every imaginable combination in a
Danish researcher Klaus Bechgaard of quest for higher and higher Tc’s. In
the University of Copenhagen and 3 January of 1987 a research team at the
French team members. (TMTSF)2PF6 University of Alabama-Huntsville
had to be cooled to an incredibly cold substituted Yttrium for Lanthanum in the
1.2K transition temperature (known as Müller and Bednorz molecule and
Tc) and subjected to high pressure to achieved an incredible 92 K Tc. For the
superconduct. But, its mere existence first time a material (today referred to as
proved the possibility of “designer” YBCO) had been found that would
molecules - molecules fashioned to superconduct at temperatures warmer
perform in a predictable way. than liquid nitrogen - a commonly
available coolant. Additional milestones
Then, in 1986, a truly breakthrough have since been achieved using exotic -
discovery was made in the field of and often toxic - elements in the base
superconductivity. Alex Müller and perovskite ceramic. The current class (or
Georg Bednorz (above), researchers at “system”) of ceramic superconductors
the IBM Research Laboratory in with the highest transition temperatures
Rüschlikon, Switzerland, created a are the mercuric-cuprates. The first
brittle ceramic compound that synthesis of one of these compounds was
superconducted at the highest achieved in 1993 at the University of
temperature then known: 30 K. What Colorado and by the team of A.
made this discovery so remarkable was Schilling, M. Cantoni, J. D. Guo, and H.
that ceramics are normally insulators. R. Ott of Zurich, Switzerland. The world
They don’t conduct electricity well at all. record Tc of 138 K is now held by a
So, researchers had not considered them thallium-doped, mercuric-cuprate
as possible high-temperature
comprised of the elements Mercury, Also in 2001 a material that had been
Thallium, Barium, Calcium, Copper and sitting on laboratory shelves for decades
Oxygen. The Tc of this ceramic was found to be an extraordinary new
superconductor was confirmed by Dr. superconductor. Japanese researchers
Ron Goldfarb at the National Institute of measured the transition temperature of
Standards and Technology-Colorado in magnesium diboride at 39 Kelvin - far
February of 1994. Under extreme above the highest Tc of any of the
pressure its Tc can be coaxed up even elemental or binary alloy
higher - approximately 25 to 30 degrees superconductors. While 39 K is still well
more at 300,000 atmospheres. below the Tc’s of the “warm” ceramic
superconductors, subsequent refinements
ISCO International: in the way MgB2 is fabricated have
paved the way for its use in industrial
applications. Laboratory testing has
The first company to capitalize on high- found MgB2 will outperform NbTi and
temperature superconductors was Illinois Nb3Sn wires in high magnetic field
Superconductor (today known as ISCO applications like MRI.
International), formed in 1989. This
amalgam of government, private- Though a theory to explain high-
industry and academic interests temperature superconductivity still
introduced a depth sensor for medical eludes modern science, clues
equipment that was able to operate at occasionally appear that contribute to
liquid nitrogen temperatures (~ 77K). our understanding of the exotic nature of
this phenomenon. In 2005, for example,
In recent years, many discoveries Superconductors.ORG discovered that
regarding the novel nature of increasing the weight ratios of
superconductivity have been made. In alternating planes within the layered
1997 researchers found that at a perovskites can often increase Tc
temperature very near absolute zero an significantly. This has led to the
alloy of gold and indium was both a discovery of no less than 30 new high-
superconductor and a natural magnet. temperature superconductors, including
Conventional wisdom held that a a candidate for a new world record.
material with such properties could not
exist! Since then, over a half-dozen such Researchers do agree on one thing:
compounds have been found. Recent discovery in the field of
years have also seen the discovery of the superconductivity is as much serendipity
first high-temperature superconductor as it is science. Stay tuned!
that does NOT contain any copper
(2000), and the first all-metal perovskite
superconductor (2001).
Types of Super-Conductors:

Type 1 Super-Conductors: Starting in 1930 with lead-bismuth

alloys, a number of alloys were found
There are thirty pure metals which which exhibited superconductivity; they
exhibit zero resistivity at low are called Type II superconductors. They
temperatures and have the property of were found to have much higher critical
excluding magnetic fields from the fields and therefore could carry much
interior of the superconductor (Meissner higher current densities while remaining
effect). They are called Type I in the superconducting state.
superconductors. The superconductivity
exists only below their critical The variations on barium-copper-oxide
temperatures and below a critical ceramics which achieved the
magnetic field strength. Type I superconducting state at much higher
superconductors are well described by temperatures are often just referred to as
the BCS theory. high temperature superconductors and
form a class of their own.
Type 2 Super-Conductors:

Uses of Super-Conductors:

Magnetically Levitated Trains: than superconducting magnets. A

landmark for the commercial use of
MAGLEV technology occurred in 1990
when it gained the status of a nationally-
funded project in Japan. The Minister of
Transport authorized construction of the
Yamanashi Maglev Test Line which
opened on April 3, 1997. In December
2003, the MLX01 test vehicle (shown
The Yamanashi MLX01 MagLev train. above) attained an incredible speed of
361 mph (581 kph).
Magnetic-levitation is an application
where superconductors perform Although the technology has now
extremely well. Transport vehicles such been proven, the wider use of MAGLEV
as trains can be made to "float" on strong vehicles has been constrained by
superconducting magnets, virtually political and environmental concerns
eliminating friction between the train (strong magnetic fields can create a bio-
and its tracks. Not only would hazard). The world's first MAGLEV
conventional electromagnets waste much train to be adopted into commercial
of the electrical energy as heat, they service, a shuttle in Birmingham,
would have to be physically much larger England, shut down in 1997 after
operating for 11 years. A Sino-German An area where superconductors can
maglev is currently operating over a 30- perform a life-saving function is in the
km course at Pudong International field of biomagnetism. Doctors need a
Airport in Shanghai, China. The U.S. non-invasive means of determining
plans to put its first (non- what's going on inside the human body.
superconducting) Maglev train into By impinging a strong superconductor-
operation on a Virginia college campus. derived magnetic field into the body,
Click this link for a website that lists hydrogen atoms that exist in the body's
other uses for MAGLEV. water and fat molecules are forced to
accept energy from the magnetic field.
MRI: They then release this energy at a
frequency that can be detected and
displayed graphically by a computer.
Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)
was actually discovered in the mid
1940's. But, the first MRI exam on a
human being was not performed until
July 3, 1977. And, it took almost five
hours to produce one image! Today's
faster computers process the data in
much less time. A tutorial is available on
MRI of a human skull.
MRI at this link. Or read the latest MRI
news at this link.

The Korean Superconductivity Group

within KRISS has carried biomagnetic
technology a step further with the
development of a double-relaxation
oscillation SQUID (Superconducting
QUantum Interference Device) for use in
Magnetoencephalography. SQUID's are
capable of sensing a change in a
magnetic field over a billion times
weaker than the force that moves the
needle on a compass (compass: 5e-5T,
SQUID: e-14T.). With this technology,
the body can be probed to certain depths
without the need for the strong magnetic
fields associated with MRI's.

Super-Collider Project:

Probably the one event, more than any

other, that has been responsible for
putting "superconductors" into the
American lexicon was the
Superconducting Super-Collider project high-temperature superconducting
planned for construction in Ellis county, generator technology toward full
Texas. Though Congress cancelled the commercialization. To read the latest
multi-billion dollar effort in 1993, the news on superconducting generators
concept of such a large, high-energy click Here.
collider would never have been viable
without superconductors. High-energy Other commercial power projects in
particle research hinges on being able to the works that employ superconductor
accelerate sub-atomic particles to nearly technology include energy storage to
the speed of light. Superconductor enhance power stability. American
magnets make this possible. CERN, a Superconductor Corp. received an order
consortium of several European nations, from Alliant Energy in late March 2000
is doing something similar with its Large to install a Distributed Superconducting
Hadron Collider (LHC) now under Magnetic Energy Storage System (D-
construction along the Franco-Swiss SMES) in Wisconsin. Just one of these 6
border. D-SMES units has a power reserve of
over 3 million watts, which can be
Other related web sites worth visiting retrieved whenever there is a need to
include the proton-antiproton collider stabilize line voltage during a
page at Fermilab. This was the first disturbance in the power grid. AMSC
facility to use superconducting magnets. has also installed more than 22 of its D-
Get information on the electron-proton VAR systems to provide instantaneous
collider HERA at the German lab pages reactive power support.
of DESY (with English text). Lastly,
Brookhaven National Laboratory
features a page dedicated to its RHIC
heavy-ion collider.

Superconductivity in Electric
Generators:

Electric generators made with

superconducting wire are far more
efficient than conventional generators
wound with copper wire. In fact, their
The General Atomics/Intermagnetics General
efficiency is above 99% and their size superconducting Fault Current Controller, employing
about half that of conventional HTS superconductors. .
generators. These facts make them very
lucrative ventures for power utilities. Super-Conductors in Electrical Wiring:
General Electric has estimated the
potential worldwide market for Recently, power utilities have also
superconducting generators in the next begun to use superconductor-based
decade at around $20-30 billion dollars. transformers and "fault limiters". The
Late in 2002 GE Power Systems Swiss-Swedish company ABB was the
received $12.3 million in funding from first to connect a superconducting
the U.S. Department of Energy to move transformer to a utility power network in
March of 1997. ABB also recently That cable was only 30 meters long, but
announced the development of a proved adequate for testing purposes. In
6.4MVA (mega-volt-ampere) fault the summer of 2001 Pirelli completed
current limiter - the most powerful in the installation of three 400-foot HTS cables
world. This new generation of HTS for Detroit Edison at the Frisbie
superconducting fault limiters is being Substation capable of delivering 100
called upon due to their ability to million watts of power. This marked the
respond in just thousandths of a second first time commercial power has been
to limit tens of thousands of amperes of delivered to customers of a US power
current. Advanced Ceramics Limited is utility through superconducting wire.
another of several companies that makes Intermagnetics General has announced
BSCCO type fault limiters. that its IGC-SuperPower subsidiary has
Intermagnetics General recently joined with BOC and Sumitomo Electric
completed tests on its largest (15kv in a $26 million project to install an
class) power-utility-size fault limiter at a underground, HTS power cable in
Southern California Edison (SCE) Albany, New York, in Niagara Mohawk
substation near Norwalk, California. Power Corporation's power grid.
And, both the US and Japan have plans Sumitomo Electric's DI-BSCCO cable
to replace underground copper power was employed in the first in-grid power
cables with superconducting BSCCO cable demonstration project sponsored
cable-in-conduit cooled with liquid by the U.S. Department of Energy and
nitrogen. (See photo below.) By doing New York Energy Research &
this, more current can be routed through Development Authority. After
existing cable tunnels. In one instance connecting to the grid successfully on
250 pounds of superconducting wire July 2006, the DI-BSCCO cable has
replaced 18,000 pounds of vintage been supplying the power to
copper wire, making it over 7000% more approximately 70,000 households
space-efficient. without any problems. The long-term
test will be completed in the 2007-2008
timeframe.

An idealized application for

superconductors is to employ them in the
transmission of commercial power to
cities. However, due to the high cost and Hypres Superconducting Microchip,
impracticality of cooling miles of Incorporating 6000 Josephson Junctions.

superconducting wire to cryogenic

temperatures, this has only happened The National Science Foundation,
with short "test runs". In May of 2001 along with NASA and DARPA and
some 150,000 residents of Copenhagen, various universities, are currently
Denmark, began receiving their researching "petaflop" computers. A
electricity through HTS (high- petaflop is a thousand-trillion floating
temperature superconducting) material. point operations per second. Today's
fastest computing operations have only to achive a desired frequency response.
reached "teraflop" speeds - trillions of This translates into an ability to pass
operations per second. Currently the desired frequencies and block
fastest is one of the IBM Blue Gene/L undesirable frequencies in high-
computers running at 280.6 teraflops per congestion rf (radio frequency)
second (with multiple CPU's). The applications such as cellular telephone
fastest single processor is a Lenslet systems. ISCO International and
optical DSP running at 8 teraflops. It has Superconductor Technologies are
been conjectured that devices on the companies currently offering such filters.
order of 50 nanometers in size along Military Use:
with unconventional switching
mechanisms, such as the Josephson Superconductors have also found
junctions associated with widespread applications in the military.
superconductors, will be necessary to HTSC SQUIDS are being used by the
achieve such blistering speeds. TRW U.S. NAVY to detect mines and
researchers (now Northrop Grumman) submarines. And, significantly smaller
have quantified this further by predicting motors are being built for NAVY ships
that 100 billion Josephson junctions on using superconducting wire and "tape".
4000 microprocessors will be necessary In mid-July, 2001, American
to reach 32 petabits per second. These Superconductor unveiled a 5000-
Josephson junctions are incorporated horsepower motor made with
into field-effect transistors which then superconducting wire (below). An even
become part of the logic circuits within larger 36.5MW HTS ship propulsion
the processors. Recently it was motor was delivered to the U.S. Navy in
demonstrated at the Weizmann Institute late 2006
in Israel that the tiny magnetic fields that
penetrate Type 2 superconductors can be
used for storing and retrieving digital
information. It is, however, not a
foregone conclusion that computers of
the future will be built around
superconducting devices. Competing
technologies, such as quantum (DELTT)
transistors, high-density molecule-scale
processors , and DNA-based processing The newest application for HTS wire is
also have the potential to achieve in the degaussing of naval vessels.
petaflop benchmarks. American Superconductor has
announced the development of a
superconducting degaussing cable.
Ultra-high-Performance Filters: Degaussing of a ship's hull eliminates
residual magnetic fields which might
In the electronics industry, ultra-high- otherwise give away a ship's presence. In
performance filters are now being built. addition to reduced power requirements,
Since superconducting wire has near HTS degaussing cable offers reduced
zero resistance, even at high frequencies, size and weight.
many more filter stages can be employed
The military is also looking at using
superconductive tape as a means of
reducing the length of very low
frequency antennas employed on
submarines. Normally, the lower the
frequency, the longer an antenna must
be. However, inserting a coil of wire
ahead of the antenna will make it
function as if it were much longer.
Unfortunately, this loading coil also
increases system losses by adding the
resistance in the coil's wire. Using A photo of Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3,
superconductive materials can in the act of disintegrating ,
taken with the European Space Agency S-CAM.
significantly reduce losses in this coil.
The Electronic Materials and Devices Other Technologies:
Research Group at University of
Birmingham (UK) is credited with Among emerging technologies are a
creating the first superconducting stabilizing momentum wheel
microwave antenna. Applications (gyroscope) for earth-orbiting satellites
engineers suggest that superconducting that employs the "flux-pinning"
carbon nanotubes might be an ideal properties of imperfect superconductors
nano-antenna for high-gigahertz and to reduce friction to near zero.
terahertz frequencies, once a method of Superconducting x-ray detectors and
achieving zero "on tube" contact ultra-fast, superconducting light
resistance is perfected. detectors are being developed due to
their inherent ability to detect extremely
E-bombs: weak amounts of energy. Already
The most ignominious military use of Scientists at the European Space Agency
superconductors may come with the (ESA) have developed what's being
deployment of "E-bombs". These are called the S-Cam, an optical camera of
devices that make use of strong, phenomenal sensitivity (see above
superconductor-derived magnetic fields photo). And, superconductors may even
to create a fast, high-intensity electro- play a role in Internet communications
magnetic pulse (EMP) to disable an soon. In late February, 2000, Irvine
enemy's electronic equipment. Such a Sensors Corporation received a $1
device saw its first use in wartime in million contract to research and develop
March 2003 when US Forces attacked an a superconducting digital router for
Iraqi broadcast facility. high-speed data communications up to
160 Ghz. Since Internet traffic is
increasing exponentially, superconductor
technology may be called upon to meet
this super need. Irvine Sensors
speculates this router may see use in
facilitating Internet2.
 Another impetus to the wider use of
superconductors is political in nature.
The reduction of green-house gas (GHG)
emissions has becoming a topical issue
due to the Kyoto Protocol which requires
the European Union (EU) to reduce its
emissions by 8% from 1990 levels by
2012. Physicists in Finland have
calculated that the EU could reduce
carbon dioxide emissions by up to 53
million tons if high-temperature
superconductors were used in power
plants.

The future melding of

superconductors into our daily lives will
also depend to a great degree on
advancements in the field of cryogenic
cooling. New, high-efficiency
magnetocaloric-effect compounds such
as gadolinium-silicon-germanium are
expected to enter the marketplace soon.
According to June 2002 estimates by the Such materials should make possible
Conectus consortium, the worldwide compact, refrigeration units to facilitate
market for superconductor products is additional HTS applications. Stay tuned!
projected to grow to near US $5 billion
by the year 2010 and to US $38 billion
by 2020. Low-temperature
superconductors are expected to Extremely weak magnetic fields
continue to play a dominant role in well-
established fields such as MRI and Superconductivity makes it possible to
scientific research, with high- measure even extremely weak magnetic
temperature superconductors enabling fields with very high accuracy.
the newer industries. The above ISIS
graph gives a rough breakdown of the An important application of
various markets in which superconductivity are SQUIDs
superconductors are expected to make a (superconducting quantum interference
contribution. devices), which can detect extremely
weak magnetic fields. They can reveal
All of this is, of course, contingent material defects and cracks, for instance
upon a linear growth rate. Should new in airplane wings, at an early stage —
superconductors with higher transition without the need to drill a test hole.
temperatures be discovered, growth and
development in this exciting field could But superconducting magnetic field
explode virtually overnight. measurements are also important in
medical diagnostics of the heart and
brain. Other important applications Magnetic fields generated with the help
include earthquake analysis and the of superconductivity are also used in
location of raw materials deposits. particle physics — for instance in the H1
detector at DESY's HERA particle
accelerator, which is used to study high-
energy particle collisions.

Superconducting SQUIDS are used to

measure magnetic fields.
The inner magnetic coil of the H1 HERA
experiment at DESY is superconducting.

Very strong magnetic fields

Superconductivity can produce

enormously powerful magnetic fields.

Wherever electric current flows,

magnetic fields are generated. Any wire
through which current flows is a small
electromagnet. A stronger and more
uniform magnetic field is generated by
having electric current flow through a
coil, in which many turns of wire are
arranged side by side. The magnetic field
can be made even stronger by using a
superconducting wire in such a coil.
Since there is no electric resistance, the
wire in such a coil can be made much
longer. The resulting magnetic fields are
much stronger than those of ordinary
permanent magnets.