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To: Glenn D. Rudolph who wrote (108446)	9/14/2000 11:31:39 AM
From: H James Morris	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

Glenn, If your into Superconductivity like me...This announcement is huge. >September 14, 2000 Scientists have dramatically boosted the amount of electricity a promising superconducting material can carry, a feat that could pave the way for cheap, highly efficient power transmission lines. The new material, which transmits six times more current than its earlier versions, is a half-inch-square wafer. But the researchers are working to make sections long enough for true power cables. "This works beautifully. We believe it's a very big step toward the fabrication of real cables which are commercially competitive," said Jochen Mannhart, a physicist at the University of Augsburg in Germany. Conventional power systems use copper wires that absorb up to 15 percent of the electricity. There is no such resistance in superconducting wires. But making such wires -- which are actually metal-and-ceramic tapes -- is expensive and time-consuming. And until now, gaps in their crystal composition have limited how much electricity they can carry. Mannhart's team overcame that problem by taking an already promising superconducting material and altering it to bridge the gaps between crystals. That boosted the capacity three-to six-fold, though the increase could be as high as 10-fold, Mannhart said. He said the same approach could be employed with other superconducting materials to boost their transmission capabilities. The research appears in today's issue of the journal Nature. Superconducting power grids could reduce power interruptions like those caused this summer by hot weather and growing energy demands. The innovation could also lead to highly efficient engines and transformers, said David Larbalestier, a physicist at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. And high-speed trains that float on electromagnetic cushions could shift from prohibitively expensive to affordable. But the first technological payoffs are at least five years away, Larbalestier said. Mannhart and colleagues used yttrium barium copper oxide, or YBCO, which becomes a superconductor when chilled with liquid nitrogen to 320 degrees below zero. Between layers of pure YBCO, they grew layers of YBCO "doped" with small amounts of calcium, which migrated and plugged the gaps between the crystals. That permitted several hundred thousand amperes to move through each half-inch square of the material. Paul C.W. Chu, a physicist at the University of Houston, called the findings the most important step in five years toward realizing the vast potential of superconductors. Chu said it could eventually reduce the high cost of superconducting cables, which are just now coming into industrial use. In those cables, the crystals must be painstakingly aligned for miles to maximize the current flow, he said. But the new multilayered YBCO construction requires no such alignment. "This is a very important step. Potentially, you no longer need a single crystal in a wire to be miles long," said Chu, who directs the Texas Center for Superconductivity.