Below their critical temperature they conduct the electrical current without resistance and thus extremely efficiently: Until now it has only been known that high-temperature superconductors work – but not how. Physicists at the University of Duisburg-Essen (UDE) have succeeded in tracking the redistribution of the energy in the material. To do this they used a medium which is itself fast enough to register these processes — light. The "Nature Communications" journal has just published their results.

While the asphalt outside slowly melted, inside the well air-conditioned NanoEnergieTechnikZentrum (NETZ) scientists from the Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology – WIN (Canada) and CENIDE met for a joint workshop on June 19 and 20. Once again it became clear: the similarities between the two nanocenters are great, the already existing cooperations are only the beginning.