Once LK-99 is successful, can your mobile phone replace the quantum computer？

　　Recently, a new superconductor at room temperature and pressure, modified lead apatite crystal structure LK-99, was released by the Korean research team. It has been a few days since the global hot discussion, although more and more research teams have joined the team to reproduce the results, which proves that LK-99 has the possibility of superconductivity in theory from many angles.

　　At present, it is inconclusive whether LK-99 can realize superconductivity at room temperature and pressure: even if LK-99 exists as a new diamagnetic material, it is already a scientific research achievement of "guaranteeing the bottom". But what everyone is most looking forward to is the arrival of superconducting materials at room temperature and pressure.

　　In March this year, researchers at the University of Rochester announced the development of a new material, which has superconducting properties at room temperature and high pressure. Although there is still a big gap between it and superconducting at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, it has already triggered an explosive discussion at that time. Although it was quickly proved to be an oolong, it has also made the progress of initially verifying LK-99' s diamagnetic properties more exciting.

　　In many discussions, Guo Ming, an analyst of Tianfeng International, who is famous for revealing accurate information about the mobile phone industry, also stepped in, imagining the impact on the product design in the consumer electronics field such as computers after the commercial application of HTS at room temperature and pressure: for example, the mobile phone no longer needs the cooling system, the optical fiber/high-grade CCL (copper clad laminate) is replaced, and the threshold of advanced manufacturing process is lowered, so that even mobile devices as small as iPhone can have the computing power comparable to quantum computers.

　　What is the concept of "matching the computing power of quantum computing"?

　　At present, the field of quantum computing is also at the critical stage of a major breakthrough: Google recently published a paper on the ArXiv platform, indicating that quantum computing has made a major breakthrough, and it can complete the calculation amount that Frontier, the most powerful classic supercomputer in the industry, takes 47.2 years to complete in a few seconds. As a comparison unit, the Frontier supercomputer is the only supercomputer that has achieved billions of calculations.

　　In contrast, Apple A16, the most powerful mobile phone chip on the mobile terminal, can achieve 200 billion floating-point calculations per second on its GPU. In other words, according to Guo Ming, almost all devices, including existing mobile phones, will be accompanied by the breakthrough of commercialization of normal temperature and pressure superconductors, which will bring unimaginable development.

　　Superconducting circuit is also the main hardware component of quantum computer, and it is a kind of superconducting circuit component called "qubit", which is similar to the transistor in classical computer, but its computational performance is several orders of magnitude higher than that of the most advanced semiconductor devices and circuits, which is the key for quantum computer to realize "quantum hegemony".

　　However, qubit also has the common defect of the current superconductor: it needs to cool the circuit to near absolute zero to work normally. Therefore, companies such as D-Wave Systems, Google and IBM all need to use large-scale low-temperature equipment called dilution refrigerator to keep the quantum computer at an extremely low temperature. Therefore, it is not too "off-topic" to use quantum computer to predict the commercial prospect of superconducting at room temperature and pressure.

　　Except quantum computers, superconductors have existed in the field of consumer electronics for many years, and they have been widely used even before room-temperature superconductivity has no clue. However, due to the strict requirements on the external environment for the superconducting state of superconductors, a large amount of liquid helium coolant required at low temperature is the main reason why various consumer-grade superconducting application scenarios are "expensive". Therefore, the application of superconducting technology has always been equated with "expensive". But we can still see the leopard from the tube and explore the possibility of superconducting materials at room temperature in the future.

　　Over the past century or so, it has been the peak period for human beings to explore superconductors, but at present, superconductors need not only ultra-low temperature but also ultra-high pressure to enter superconducting state. Harsh Mathur, a physicist at Case Western Reserve University, said in an e-mail interview that "superconductors have been used in some fields: but the superconducting characteristics of low temperature and high pressure are the main bottleneck that hinders the wider application of superconductors at present.

　　Superconductor is a material that can conduct direct current without encountering any resistance. And resistance is the main source of electrical equipment resistance that hinders current flow and even generates heat. Superconducting material without resistance means that it can support large current without any energy loss due to resistance. This efficiency is almost fantastic in the field of power transmission.

　　If superconductors are really discovered, in the field of consumer electronics, superconducting power lines can greatly reduce the energy loss in the process of supplying power from power plants to homes, offices and factories. Not only can it greatly alleviate the existing energy difficulties of human beings, but almost all devices currently plagued by battery life, such as mobile phones, laptops, electric cars, etc., will benefit a lot from it.

　　In recent decades, researchers have successively developed several so-called "high-temperature superconductors", which can reach the superconducting critical point only by cooling to MINUS 23 degrees Celsius. Although special equipment is still needed to cool down, high-temperature superconductors have shown the prospect of being easier to use than traditional superconductors, which has also prompted more people to put them into experimental commercial scenes.

　　2021 年，联邦爱迪生公司采用新型高温超导技术构建的线缆，在芝加哥北部搭建起一套高温超导输电网络，借此向外界展示了一套完整的、同时为芝加哥北区供电的超导技术。

　　在为期一年的试用期中。与传统铜线构建的电网相比，升级后的超导线缆可传输 200 倍的电流。但由于维持超导体所需的低温和高压的成本，在大多数商用电网中，即使是这样的效率提升，在现实中大规模应用仍显不切实际。

　　据推算，如果常温常压超导材料被应用在电网中，人类现有电网发电效率将比现在的电网至少高出 20%，每年可节省数十亿美元。磁悬浮列车也可以以更低的成本运行更长的距离。计算机运行速度会更快，功耗会降低几个数量级。量子计算机也搭载更多的量子比特，从而能够将如今的量子计算机算力提升一个数量级。

　　室温超导材料还能为消费电子场景带来许多新的可能性，包括可用于列车悬浮和控制核聚变反应堆的强磁铁。同时也能在实现下一代的超高速互联网和低延迟宽带无线通信方向发挥重大作用。

　　Room temperature superconductors can also realize high-resolution imaging technology and emerging sensors for biomedical and security applications, material and structure analysis and deep space radio astrophysics. In a word, the discovery and commercialization of room temperature and atmospheric pressure superconductors will change almost every aspect of consumer electronics.

　　Every step forward in basic science is of great significance to the application field. However, whether this bright prospect of electronic technology can be realized and how quickly it can be realized depends on whether the new room temperature superconductor material can be verified and whether it can be produced on a large scale in an economical and efficient way.

　　Harsh Mathur also believes that the most critical application of room temperature superconducting technology after commercialization is probably unpredictable. He cited Michael Faraday, the "father of electricity", as an example that his research in the 19th century triggered the first power revolution, including the invention of power generation and transmission.

　　"At that time, when Faraday was asked what use his discovery might have in the future, the famous scientist's answer was," What's the use of a newborn baby? "The semiconductor revolution that arose in the 1940s changed our way of life, but it was still difficult to foresee the existence of GPS, streaming media platforms or AIGC. Just as we can't completely predict a world where superconductors are popular at room temperature and pressure.