Slim, warm superconductors promise faster electronics
Tuesday, 10. November 2009, 10:03:06
The thinnest superconductor yet is a layer of copper oxide material less than a nanometre thick. The feat suggests a new possible route to faster electronic components.
Making superconductors super-skinny raises the prospect of being able to switch them on and off using electric fields, says Ivan Bozovic at Brookhaven National Laboratories in Upton, New York. That could allow them to be used in electronics, not just for carrying current from place to place.
"Static electric fields cannot penetrate more than 1 nanometre into good conductors," explains Bozovic, whose team carried out the new study. So a very thin superconductor indeed is needed to use electric fields in this way.
Source: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18076-slim-warm-superconductors-promise-faster-electronics.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news
Making superconductors super-skinny raises the prospect of being able to switch them on and off using electric fields, says Ivan Bozovic at Brookhaven National Laboratories in Upton, New York. That could allow them to be used in electronics, not just for carrying current from place to place.
"Static electric fields cannot penetrate more than 1 nanometre into good conductors," explains Bozovic, whose team carried out the new study. So a very thin superconductor indeed is needed to use electric fields in this way.
Source: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18076-slim-warm-superconductors-promise-faster-electronics.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news
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