The Superconductor That Wasn’t: Verification Team Can’t Confirm Claim of Revolutionary Discovery

A South Korean verification team said they cannot confirm the claims of researchers who said they discovered the first superconductor that works at room temperature and ambient pressure.

The verification committee was assembled after two papers by South Korean researchers were published on arxiv, an archive of preprint scientific studies, in July. Preprints are papers that have not yet been peer reviewed for accuracy or published in a journal. 

In their paper, the South Korean researchers claimed that a version of the mineral lead apatite they called LK-99 was able to superconduct electricity at room temperatures, and under the normal atmospheric pressure experienced by humans on the Earth’s surface.

In a statement sent to The Messenger, members of the assessment committee said that data presented by those researchers showed LK-99 still showed resistance. They added that a video made by the researchers, in which they claimed LK-99 displayed the Meissner Effect - where the magnetic field generated by a superconductor is so powerful that it can levitate over a magnet - did not actually show what they said it did. 

“In the video, LK-99 floats above the magnet, but always with a part of it touching the magnet, and it appears to oscillate after it moves,” they said. “These characteristics are inconsistent with the magnetic levitation properties of superconductors. The paper claims that it is only partially levitating because it is not a perfect sample, but there is an attraction between the magnet and the sample, which could be interpreted as a relative repulsion that keeps the sample at a certain distance from the magnet."

At the time of the preprints’ publication, members of the physics community expressed skepticism over the claims, saying data in the papers appeared to be missing or was presented in puzzling ways. Several labs attempted to do their own experiments with LK-99, with none saying they got it to pass superconductivity tests. 

But the committee did not definitely rule out LK-99 as a superconductor. In the statement, they said that once the original researchers share their sample with them, it will be sent to several independent labs for testing. Efforts are also underway to synthesize LK-99 at three more labs who will also run tests.

Room temperature superconductors remain one of the most sought-after discoveries in science. In most materials used to conduct electricity, such as copper wire, atoms within the materials slow down the passage of electrons, a process known as resistance. In superconductors, that resistance is gone, which makes the materials far more efficient. But all known superconductors require very specific circumstances to work, such as extreme cold that approaches absolute zero or high levels of pressure. 

Despite those requirements, superconductors to have uses, including in medical machinery like MRIs, but a superconductor that can operate under far more common conditions would revolutionize technology, allowing for more efficient and cleaner power grids and cheaper quantum computers. One scientist told The Messenger that discovering a room temperature superconductor would guarantee a Nobel Prize.