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TheRtRevKaiser@kbin.social

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Failed replication of claimed superconductor reported on arxiv (arxiv.org)

submitted 1 year ago by maegul@lemmy.ml to c/technology

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[–] NotMyOldRedditName@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Reminds me of race conditions in programming.

1 in 15 times the bug happens and you can't figure it out, but if 2 asynchronous events happen to happen within 10ms of each other it breaks.

Could be some super specific timing on one of the steps where a discrepancy of a short time doesn't seem meaningful but is

[–] jarfil 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Could be some super specific timing on one of the steps where a discrepancy of a short time doesn't seem meaningful but is

This is actually quite likely:

The fabrication process consists of three separate heating-holding-cooling sequences, each one with a different holding temperature and timing.
These sequences repeatedly anneal the material, changing its cristalline structure.
The superconducting effect, is explained in terms of a slightly compressed crystalline structure creating a series of channels for electron tunnelling to happen.

If it wasn't all a scam, then it is very likely that a very precise temperature profile needs to be met in order for the effect to appear. It might've even been a fluke, and they themselves might be unable to fully reproduce it.

In the papers, they only got 4 samples, and still they seem to have messed around with some of them, so effectively no two samples had the same measurements (some were used for different tests, some were changed when used in the same test).

[–] NotMyOldRedditName@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Well the good thing is they were able to reproduce it themselves so they won't drive themselves fully crazy trying to narrow that down, assuming not a scam.

I wonder how much you could automate that all to remove as much human factor as possible and be down to exact times if needed.

[–] jarfil 2 points 1 year ago

they were able to reproduce it themselves

It makes me wonder if they were, or how many attempts it took them to produce just 4 samples.

The process should be possible to automate completely, with the right temperature profile (commonly used in electronics, for reflow ovens and such).

But I wonder if there might be some other detail they might have forgotten to take into account... like maybe at some point you have to take the sample out with non-ferromagnetic tongs, but put it in with ferromagnetic ones, or flip it to the side, or align it with the heating coils of the oven, or whatever "irrelevant detail" like that.