According to ScienceMag, a group of researchers from MIT stacked two microscopic cards of graphene and twisted one slightly. Then, after applying an electrical field, they transformed the stack from the stack was transformed from a conductor to an insulator, and then, oddly, into a superconductor, a material capable of frictionless conduction of energy.

When this discovery reached electronics manufacturers in 2018, they began to realize that the new material could be implemented in real products.This discovery caused a surge of laboratories around the world to attempt to create novel electronic devices easily. Two of these laboratories are now succeeding to an extent, with the idea showing promise.

The secret behind this discovery is mainly in a “Magic Angle” of sorts. When researchers rotate the sheets by precisely 1.1 degrees, the twist makes a “moiré” pattern, i.e. atoms in the pattern of the darker bands seen when two grids are juxtaposed. By bringing thousands of these atoms together, the moiré causes them to act in unison, similarly to superatoms. This uniformity causes a small number of electrons to rapidly change the material’s behavior, ending with the material as a superconductor.

This new method is much simpler and easier to be done than systems for creating superconductors others, and could possibly revolutionize superconducting electronics. It will obviously take a moment for these unique materials to make it into everyday hardware.

Image from Wikipedia