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Next Big Future:
- Harvard researchers created solid metallic hydrogen in the lab and studied it - This is already huge but could be fantastic if properties are as predicted:
Harvard researchers have studied and observed solid hydrogen under pressure at low temperatures. With increasing pressure we observe changes in the sample, going from transparent, to black, to a reflective metal, the latter studied at a pressure of 495 GPa. They have measured the reflectance as a function of wavelength in the visible spectrum finding values as high as 0.90 from the metallic hydrogen. They have fit the reflectance using a Drude free electron model to determine the plasma frequency of 30.1 eV at T= 5.5 K, with a corresponding electron carrier density of 6.7x10^23 particles/cm3 , consistent with theoretical estimates. The properties are those of a metal. Solid metallic hydrogen has been produced in the laboratory.
- they have made some metallic hydrogen and have it in a cryostat in liquid nitrogen
- they might leave it under pressure and let it warm to room temperature or they could keep it cold and release the pressure
- they are planning to test for high temperature superconductivity
If it stays a metal at room temperature and after releasing pressure and was also a superconductor then it would be the holy grail of physics.
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- Co-discoverer of Metallic Hydrogen wrote paper on metallic hydrogen for rockets
- If newly created metallic hydrogen stays stable when brought back to regular pressure as predicted by theory then eventually the world will radically change
- Metallic hydrogen is metastable could be used as superlightweight structural material for floating cities