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From: dplatt@teknowledge-vaxc.UUCP
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: Re: New superconducting (Houston)
Message-ID: <9566@teknowledge-vaxc.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 17-Feb-87 20:10:02 EST
Article-I.D.: teknowle.9566
Posted: Tue Feb 17 20:10:02 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 19-Feb-87 06:18:20 EST
References: <503@puff.WISC.EDU>
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In-reply-to: schumann@puff.WISC.EDU's message of 17 Feb 87 19:27:10 GMT
Posting-Front-End: GNU Emacs 18.33.2 of Fri Feb 13 1987 on teknowledge-vaxc (berkeley-unix)

Based on what I saw in the San Jose Mercury-News, a research team has
developed an alloy which begins exhibiting superconducting behavior at
an extremely high temperature (well above the boiling-point of liquid
helium, and well below the boiling point of liquid nitrogen) at
"normal" pressures.  If I've got these details correctly, then it is
indeed a major breakthrough... all previous "high"-temperature
semiconductors have required extremely high pressures to operate (e.g.
several thousand or million PSI), and none have switched to
semiconducting behavior at liquid-nitrogen temperatures.

In short, it means that semiconductive circuits (e.g.
magnetic-levitation systems) can now be refrigerated with liquid
nitrogen, which is MUCH cheaper and easier to handle than liquid
helium.  This should increase the practical use of semiconductors in
maglev systems, power-generation, lasers, etc. by an order of
magnitude.