On April 8, 1911, at the Leiden Cryogenic Laboratory in the Netherlands, Heike Kamerlingh Onnes and his collaborators immersed a mercury capillary in liquid helium and saw the mercury's electrical resistance drop to nothing once the temperature reached about 3 kelvins, or 3 degrees above absolute zero (around –270 Celsius).

This phenomenon of "superconductivity" was one of the first quantum phenomena to be discovered, although back then quantum theory did not exist. In subsequent decades theoreticians were able to put quantum physics on a solid foundation and explain superconductivity. Since then, researchers have discovered new families of materials that superconduct at higher and higher temperatures: the current record-holder works at a balmy 138 K.

So where's my maglev train?

Indeed, the promise of superconductors—power grids that waste no energy, computers that run at untold gigahertz of speed without overheating and, yes, trains that levitate over magnetic fields—has not fully materialized.

Still, superconductors have made it possible to build the strong magnets that power magnetic resonance imaging machines, which are the most important commercial application of the phenomenon to this day. And scientists use superconductors in advanced experiments every day. For instance, particle accelerators at the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva rely on superconducting coils to generate magnetic fields that steer and focus beams of protons. Some of the most accurate measurements in all of science are done thanks to superconducting quantum interference devices, or SQUIDs.

And finally, superconducting electrical transmission lines are here. Wires based on high-temperature superconductors (with liquid nitrogen–based cryogenics, which are technically simpler and much cheaper than liquid helium–based ones) have recently become commercially available. A South Korean utility plans to install them on a large scale. Some U.S. scientists now say that it may be easier to get permits for and build a national superconducting supergrid than construct a conventional high-voltage system.

This slide show reviews Onnes's discovery and the milestones that followed it.

9 Comments

1. 1. ennui 06:23 PM 4/8/11

   I thought that his name was Heike Omnes, not Onnes.
   At least that is what we learned in Holland.
   These super conducting magnets in the Hadron Colider could have beem replaced at a fraction of the cost by the electrical fields that can be generated by the One Terminal Capacitor, the technology used by the Flying Saucer.

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2. 2. ennui 06:31 PM 4/8/11

   Further to my comment, it is possible to transmit wireless, massive amounts of power using the one Terminal Capacitor system, as well as generating it.

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3. 3. naino90 07:51 PM 4/8/11

   Actually his name was Heike Kamerlingh-Onnes. Double names were often used in Holland by wealthy families or e.g. kids of same mother, different father.I don't know about his situation. One of the labs of the university of Leiden is still named after him.

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4. 4. JDahiya 03:56 AM 4/9/11

   Superconductivity is one of the phenomena that attract people to study physics in breathless awe. Thank you for the slide show, and bringing it up to 2006.

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5. 5. bewertow in reply to ennui 10:18 PM 4/14/11

   @ ennui
   
   Hi there ennui are you on crack?

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6. 6. Plain-2009 03:35 AM 4/15/11

   Excuse me Ennui what Flying Saucer are you talking about, and what is that One Terminal Capacitor?

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7. 7. Charlie0057 11:45 AM 4/15/11

   @Plain-2009, could it be similar to a flux capacitor?

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8. 8. Charlie0057 11:48 AM 4/15/11

   Thank you, SA, for an informative slide show. Like you I want my mag-lev train!

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9. 9. Plain-2009 02:22 AM 4/16/11

   When I read “flux capacitor”(Charlie0057) you will not believe me but I though about a toilet. I also remember “magnetic flux” or “flux density” from Electricity and Magnetism; that nice book from Mr. Francis Weston Sears. A real beauty. I have no idea if there is something similar or even better these days. Are the books of Mr. Sears still read? I also remember “momentum flux” from those nice people studying Transport Phenomena (Byron Bird, Warren E. Stewart, and Edwin N. Lightfoot). That concept, that should be simple, at that time, may be busy with many things, almost dove me crazy. May be one day we will understand more about gravity. How to make a Flying Saucer. DeLorean with a “flux capacitor” traveling through time may take a little longer. Time is a curios thing. Sometimes I feel like if time does not exist. But, of course, we can think about a sequence of events. Yeah, thanks to SA that provides us, not only beautiful and valuable information, but means to exchange ideas; and a joke from time to time. And, Yeah Charlie0057 that idea of a mag-lev train sounds interesting!Good regards!

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