Light Touch Transforms Material into Superconductor
OXFORD, England, Jan. 19, 2011 — One hundred years after superconductivity was first observed in 1911, a team from Oxford, Germany and Japan observed conclusive signatures of superconductivity after hitting a non-superconductor with a strong burst of laser light. “We have used light to turn a normal insulator into a superconductor,” said Andrea Cavalleri, professor of the Department of Physics at Oxford University and the Max Planck Department for Structural Dynamics, Hamburg. “That’s already excitin...