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Scientists Create New Type of Superconductor Wires
An anonymous reader writes "Scientists in Israel have used technology created at a U.S.-funded national research lab to created a new kind of wire spun from sapphire crystals, that is a vastly better conductor than traditional copper wires. The research could have profound implications for renewable energy since much of the generation is in remote locations. It could help bring more electricity from renewable sources to cities."
I'm thinking that this doesn't actually exhibit the phenomenon known as "superconductivity" and is simple a low-resistance conductor.
excellent, i'm very excited. when can I buy a roll of this new wire at home depot?
So, this stuff won't cure cancer, but it might help with renewable energy:
Among the many other possible beneficiaries of the team's new creation that comes to mind would be the hyper-ambitious international DESERTEC organization, which seeks to harvest massive amounts of solar energy in deserts and transmit it to population centers, for example from Africa to Europe.
Except for the small detail that it has to be cooled to liquid nitrogen temperature to act as superconductor and an entire desert transmission line sitting in LN would take a bunch of energy, what's not to like?
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
I'm guessing this does not exhibit the phenomenon known as "superconductivity" and is rather just a low-resistance conductor.
Tina Casey, I think you meant "super conductor".
My brain....
Electrons on the outside, photons on the inside. Double the bandwidth.
Even if it needs liquid nitrogen cooling at least nitrogen is abundant unlike helium.
If the cost for cooling per mile/kilometer is less than the profit generated by solar power from a desert region then I can see someone giving it a go. Unfortunately, there isn't any rough costs for doing so in the article.
I wonder if they are using electric blue sapphires?
... what's the advantage of using this over, say, BSCCO, or any other "high temperature" superconductor? They still have to be cooled with LN2, which means that long-distance power transfer, as proposed in the article, is completely infeasible.
better article: http://www.sciencenewsline.com/technology/2011090708160001.html
www.RacquetUp.org - Helping Detroit Youth
Wires spun from sapphire?
It matches my diamond encrusted tube amp and mahogany power plug perfectly!
This news is quite strange. As far as I know sapphire itself is NEVER a superconductor at any temperature. The superconductivity might just come from the "specialized ceramic coating" that is mentioned, since the LN2 temperature superconductors are usually ceramics, so called "high temperature superconductor". The problem of such material is that it is quite brittle and you can never draw a wire with it. I assume the improvement here is how to fabricate such wire with this material.
... covered with High-Tc superconductor film, epitaxially grown. So yes, it would work.
Much better info about this R&D for /. crowd : http://www.rdmag.com/RD100-Awards-Rounding-The-Edges-On-Superconductor-Wires/
Paul B.
Is there any particular reason the USA is paying for a lab to be built in Israel while, at the same time, people are complaining about how we can't build or innovate anything in the USA?
As an expert in superconductivity (Physical Review Letter in 1976, among others), I find no substance in this "news" article. Sapphire, of course, is not a superconductor. Since sapphire is a common substrate for making thin films of ceramic superconductors, that's likely what's being done. However, the current-carrying ability of these strands will be small, since the magnetic field caused by the current will destroy the superconductivity.
See http://www.rdmag.com/RD100-Awards-Rounding-The-Edges-On-Superconductor-Wires/ which I reached via the sapphire outfit's site. The sapphire is a substrate for epitaxial deposition of an unspecified superconductor. It is not the conductor and the story is making more sense now.
As Bernd T. Matthius, the famous physicist, used to say when people touted this or that new superconducting material, "Make me a cable!" Exotic materials that work in the lab often can't be made into a cable of any length or usefulness.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
It could help bring more electricity from renewable sources to cities
It could also help bring more electricity from non-renewable sources to cities. And villages.
The three laws of thermodynamics:(1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit.
The TAU research team took the project a step farther by combining the fibers with a self-contained cooling system based on liquid nitrogen
It sounds like all the Israelis did was to immerse the wire (developed by the Americans) in liquid nitrogen.
Not exactly what I would call created/developed by Israelis.
The Israelis also developed the Ferrari 458 Italia by filling the tank with gasoline.
Sapphire is an insulator. It's not a conductor of electricity, let alone a superconductor.
These wires must be coated with a high-temperature superconductor (one that superconducts in liq-N).
What's the current / current density that they have achieved?
I guess with the inflated cost of copper, this ceramic coating on spun sapphire wire, encased in an insulating medium filled with liquid nitrogen, is really cheaper to manufacture and install than copper wire.
Like Axis said, it's a lot cheaper if made on site. Also, as I understand it the way superconducting power lines are made(there are a few already), they're made of liquid-proof, but not gas tight highly insulated cables.
As the cable is superconducting, you don't have heat buildup from resistance, so it's all environmental. You simply have enough space around the tubes for the nitrogen to disburse. Nitrogen is non-toxic, though you might want an O2 mask in some circumstances.
As the nitrogen is a liquid, they only need to keep pumping more in as small amounts of it boil off.
I remember an article about it a while back - they were replacing 11 oil cooled power lines with 3 superconducting. The electricity needed to keep the lines cold was projected to be less than what was needed to pump the oil, much less what was lost as heat in the pipes.
I don't read AC A human right
Or we could - you know - boost the voltage a transformer and transfer the power over small conductors with relatively low losses,
And for longer runs we could use High Voltage DC
But liquid nitrogen and sapphire would work too...
Custom, hands-free Linux installs. Instalinux
If you're running superconducting lines, you can bury them because you don't need to worry about them getting grounded. That means fewer weather related power outages.
I suspect this is YBCO grown on a sapphire wire. Previously, YBCO has been grown on flat substrates.
In bulk liquid nitrogen costs less than milk.
Interesting approach, but the linked article is so bad even i had to scratch my head for a few minutes and follow the link to the company to understand it (Sapphire is a nearly perfect insulator, even at low temperatures, what the linked article calls glue seems to be the (epitaxially grown?) HTC SC material).
to address some comments here: the use of liquid nitrogen is not the special thing here. Cables cooled by liquid nitrogen have been in test for a long time.
What i am missing is a comparison to other superconducting cables, so AFAIU:
Normally to make HTC SC wire you grow HTC crystals (a dark art by itself, much like cooking), crush these and press it into a metal band to be able to bend the conductor and you essentially hope that somehoe the grains inside the filaments touch each other (they do). The current is only carried in the surface of the grains anyway and these HTCs are brittle, so you can in principle use a very stable insulator core (like sapphire), grow a thin layer of HTC on it (of which you can control the composition perfectly) and save the effort of providing additional mechanical stability.
This is only going to make the problem of cable theft even worse! My train is frequently delayed because some selfish numbnut has stolen the signalling/power cables to sell the copper. Imagine what is going to happen when they find out that these cables are made out of sapphires!
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
Imagine a wires made out of sapphire. I am not sure they will be financially viable for long distance usage. Copper is getting stolen, imagine safeguarding sapphire wires!!
O this learning! What a thing it is - William Shakespeare
But any advance in this area is a good thing, if you ask me. We don't have enough copper to serve everyone's needs and its Ohm's Law losses are too much to be acceptable in the future.
cheers...ank
Still hoping for Gentle Treatment...
It is not a conductor, at any temperature.
First, I thought sapphires were less abundant than copper making it much more expensive no matter the process.
But advances in low cost production technologies has changed the equation, making the mass use of such fibers a potential possibility.
Second, I had no idea there was a self-contained liquid nitrogen system that could be applied to the actual wire. Why hasn't this replaced liquid nitrogen stations? Please tell me this is a confusion on the part of the writer.
The TAU research team took the project a step farther by combining the fibers with a self-contained cooling system based on liquid nitrogen, which keeps the sapphire wire in a highly efficient superconducting state without overheating.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
Here is a thought. If you lived in Australia, close to both the desert and the ocean, and have the technology listed below; would you become our new OPEC style rich overlords?
1) You are capable of creating glass fiber from sand using solar energy (solar oven).
2) You are able to use the glass as an insulator for superconductive wire.
3) You are capable of using solar energy to create hydrogen from the ocean which then can then be used to super cool the wire.
4) You are able to run the wire on the ocean floor to surrounding Islands and sell electricity.
How hard is it to learn Australian?
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
Lemme get this straight. Some nerdy-pants wants to pipe power from the middle of the Saharan Desert to Europe because that is renewable energy? HA!
How renewable will it be when a natural disaster wipes out the power plant in africa? Or the pipe? How much time and money will it take to FIND the break in the line or rebuild the plant? What happens when 'terrorists' blow-up or take control of the plant? Pfft...
It's only sustainable if it's local.
Are your ears burning? Someone just talked about you.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2417686&cid=37337828