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Surprising Superconduction in Plutonium

Posted by michael on from the million-and-one-uses dept.

jihema writes "Dr Strangelove would have liked this : a plutonium compound turns out to be a superconductor at relatively high temperature (18 K). The magnetic properties of this metal make this fact rather unexpected and contradicts the accepted theory on superconduction."

1 of 49 comments (clear)

  1. 18K is pretty warm given the circumstances.. by Tyrnagog · · Score: 3, Interesting

    All of the very high K superconductors (>100 K) are (IIRC) brittle ceramic compunds that could not be easily constructed into something of commercial use.

    While Plutonium is "extremely radioactive and chemically toxic", it is just a base metal, not a compound. I am not to familiar with the metallic properties of Plutonium (malleability, brittleness, etc) but I would imagine that if one metal (even if it is trans-uranic) has high K properties like Plutonium, others may as well...