Scientists in China and US chart latest discoveries of iron-based superconductors
Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - 11:50
in Physics & Chemistry
Superconductivity is a remarkable macroscopic quantum phenomenon, discovered just over a century ago. As temperature decreases to below a critical value, the electric resistance of a superconductor vanishes and the magnetic field is repelled. Superconductors have many applications, and can be used to transport electricity without loss of energy. Conventional superconductivity is explained by the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer theory, posited more than five decades ago. In a superconducting state, two electrons with opposite momenta attract each other to form a bound pair. The pairing mechanism in a conventional superconductor is due to couplings between electrons and phonons, which are a quantum version of lattice vibrations.