Superconducting Potential

The specialized research into super-conductivity by physicists in hitech laboratories in the United States, Europe and Japan is setting the stage for bold advances which could result in great economic benefits for the region.
Scientists predict that within ten to twenty years they will have produced superconducting power lines to transmit electricity without loss of power. Even more important, they expect to develop a means to store electric energy indefinitely as a circulating current.

Superconductors are materials that conduct electricity without resistance. Until recently, achieving super¬conductivity required freezing materials to temperatures close to absolute zero (-494 degrees Fahrenheit). Starting with a series of advances in 1985, scientists have discovered materials that would become superconducting at higher temperatures. As a result, superfast computers and computer chips are now expected within the next five years. Other early applications of super¬conductivity will be in electronics and those functions for which no current need be carried, such as frictionless bearings that would float, suspended by magnetic levitation.