4 ms·

If it's real, how fast could we see concrete applications using this material? 5-year time frame? 10-year time frame? More?

radicaldreamer 3y ago
Nobody knows, it depends on a multitude of factors, but most likely this won't be the exact material which will have applications, I'm sure there is a much easier to fabricate related material which will be the first of a whole set of materials which act as superconductors at room temperatures.
- moffkalast 3y ago
  Why be so sure about that? I really hope it doesn't turn out to be graphene 2.0, a material that can revolutionize everything but can't be produced consistently and in usable quantities by any means at all.
- distortionfield 3y ago
  Yeah, this feels like the really early results of a material that they eventually refine into a process, hence their patents. There are reports they were worried about being beaten to the punch, im curious if that’s true and if so, who the word on the street said was close.
brucethemoose2 3y ago
> if you could grow a good single crystal of LK-99, it seems as if the superconductivity might only occur along one crystal axis: put crudely, you'd see superconductivity if you hooked your wires to two particular opposite faces of said crystal, but not to the others! Crystalline grain boundaries are already known to be a big deal in the efficiency of existing superconducting materials, and this would mean that polycrystalline samples of LK-99 would be pretty unfavorable to demonstrating robust effects. I think this means production of usable superconducting masses will be tricky, if its even possible. So... Probably on the longer side? Time will be needed to figure out how to make it macroscopically, or discover a similar compound thats easier to produce in bulk. But once wire, coils, high purity samples and such start getting sold, I think the adoption would be very quick.
- distortionfield 3y ago
  But what you just described would still be insanely valuable. Just in the field of semiconductors and chip fab, it would probably unlock insane gains.
  - brucethemoose2 3y ago
    Probably yeah. But I dont want to jump to conclusions. I dont think its a drop in replacement for, say, the copper substrate.
themagician 3y ago
If real it will be weaponized in 90-days.
nemo44x 3y ago
You'd need breakthroughs in the manufacturing of it (yield, process, scale, etc) and then building the infrastructure and supply chain to support it. Depending on its availability you could see governments hoard the material for "security" and "public interest" use cases, etc. Military first as usual. If this turns out to be a super conducting material you can be assured that overnight there will be many thousands of people all around the world, from academic, corporate, government, and private labs working with the new theory and materials and discoveries will occur as our understanding of the phenomenon get deeper and wider. There will be so much incentive to find new methods and materials that have the properties of this material.
DesiLurker 3y ago
if its real (or real even in principle as in hard to repro say 1 in 20 times) even than the immediate consequence would be a lot of investment directly flowing into the research. combining that with some AI based techniques I'd say (if the idealized material bears out predictions at room temp) within half a decade we will see good manufacturing techniques. after that its all application specific.

radicaldreamer 3y ago

Nobody knows, it depends on a multitude of factors, but most likely this won't be the exact material which will have applications, I'm sure there is a much easier to fabricate related material which will be the first of a whole set of materials which act as superconductors at room temperatures.

moffkalast 3y ago
Why be so sure about that? I really hope it doesn't turn out to be graphene 2.0, a material that can revolutionize everything but can't be produced consistently and in usable quantities by any means at all.
distortionfield 3y ago
Yeah, this feels like the really early results of a material that they eventually refine into a process, hence their patents. There are reports they were worried about being beaten to the punch, im curious if that’s true and if so, who the word on the street said was close.

brucethemoose2 3y ago

> if you could grow a good single crystal of LK-99, it seems as if the superconductivity might only occur along one crystal axis: put crudely, you'd see superconductivity if you hooked your wires to two particular opposite faces of said crystal, but not to the others! Crystalline grain boundaries are already known to be a big deal in the efficiency of existing superconducting materials, and this would mean that polycrystalline samples of LK-99 would be pretty unfavorable to demonstrating robust effects. I think this means production of usable superconducting masses will be tricky, if its even possible. So... Probably on the longer side? Time will be needed to figure out how to make it macroscopically, or discover a similar compound thats easier to produce in bulk. But once wire, coils, high purity samples and such start getting sold, I think the adoption would be very quick.

distortionfield 3y ago
But what you just described would still be insanely valuable. Just in the field of semiconductors and chip fab, it would probably unlock insane gains.
- brucethemoose2 3y ago
  Probably yeah. But I dont want to jump to conclusions. I dont think its a drop in replacement for, say, the copper substrate.

themagician 3y ago

If real it will be weaponized in 90-days.

nemo44x 3y ago

You'd need breakthroughs in the manufacturing of it (yield, process, scale, etc) and then building the infrastructure and supply chain to support it. Depending on its availability you could see governments hoard the material for "security" and "public interest" use cases, etc. Military first as usual. If this turns out to be a super conducting material you can be assured that overnight there will be many thousands of people all around the world, from academic, corporate, government, and private labs working with the new theory and materials and discoveries will occur as our understanding of the phenomenon get deeper and wider. There will be so much incentive to find new methods and materials that have the properties of this material.

DesiLurker 3y ago

if its real (or real even in principle as in hard to repro say 1 in 20 times) even than the immediate consequence would be a lot of investment directly flowing into the research. combining that with some AI based techniques I'd say (if the idealized material bears out predictions at room temp) within half a decade we will see good manufacturing techniques. after that its all application specific.