Superconductor: entirely new state of matter discovered

Tiny holes punched into a high-temperature superconducting material revealed that Cooper pairs, electron duos that enable superconductivity, can also conduct electricity the way metals do. Credit: Valles lab / Brown University
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Researchers at Brown University have showed that Cooper pairs, electron duos that enable superconductivity, can also conduct electricity like normal metals do.

For years, physicists have assumed that Cooper pairs, the electron duos that enable superconductors to conduct electricity without resistance, either create a superconducting state, either create an insulating state. But the team of researchers has shown that Cooper pairs can also conduct electricity with some amount of resistance, as regular metals do.

The idea that boson-like Cooper pairs are responsible for this metallic state is something of a surprise, because there are elements of quantum theory that suggest this shouldn’t be possible. (SciTech)

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