Observation of near room temperature thin film superconductivity of atmospherically stable Ag-Au mesoscopic thin film

TL;DR

This study reports the observation of near room temperature superconductivity in a stable Ag-Au mesoscopic thin film, characterized by a sharp resistance drop around 240 K, with stability after multiple temperature cycles.

Contribution

It demonstrates a novel method to create a stable, near room temperature superconductor using a layered Ag-Au thin film on an ion-implanted oxide substrate.

Findings

Resistance drops by 6-7 orders at ~240 K

Transition temperature stabilizes after multiple cycles near 0°C

Magnetic field reduces transition temperature by 4 K

Abstract

An environmentally stable mesoscopic thin film of Au of certain thickness has been deposited thermally on top of a Ag+ implanted oxide substrate to develop a close to room temperature superconductor. This thin film has been deposited in two different stages. Initially, a sol-gel derived ion conducting metal oxide (ICMO) thin film has been deposited by spin coating. Afterward, Ag+ has been introduced inside ICMO thin film by a chemical method. Following this, a thin layer of Au has been deposited on top of that Ag ion-implanted oxide via thermal evaporation. The temperature dependent resistivity (R-T) has been studied by four probe method. During high-to-low temperature sweep, around 240 K this thin film sample shows a sudden drop of resistance from 0.7 Ohm to 0.1 micro-Ohm. This 6-7 orders drop of resistance has been observed instantly within <0.1 K temperature variation of the sample. This transition temperature (TC) has been shifted toward the higher temperature by 5-6 degrees when temperature has been increased from low to the higher side. During 2nd and 3rd temperature cycling, both these transitions have been shifted by ~10 K towards room temperature w.r.t the earlier. However, after three successive temperature cycles, TC becomes stable and transitions occur close to 0 oC repeatedly. At the low resistance phase, current level has been varied from +100 mA to -100 mA which shows a random fluctuation of voltage drop within 10 nV range, indicating resistance under such circumstance is too low to measure by Delta mode electrical measurement (0.1 micro-Ohm). Besides, transition temperature reduces to lower temperature by 4 K, after applying 1 tesla magnetic field perpendicular to the thin film. Few YouTube video links of temperature dependent electrical characterization of such a thin film is given next to the acknowledgement section.