The Quest Heats Up

Kamerlingh Onnes was keenly aware of the potential value of his discovery of superconductivity, especially as it 

it was far from easy to reach the low temperatures required, and it was difficult to work at those temperatures. Precise measurements at such cold temperatures were also not easily obtained. One way to make such measurements was to measure the known pressure of, say, a known quantity of hydrogen or helium, a tricky procedure since the interrelationship of temperature and pressure at temperatures close to absolute zero is rather capricious. Intricate electrical devices must also be used to measure resistance changes in magnetic properties must be carefully monitored, as well as the speed of sound waves traveling through helium. 

The other problem Kamerlingh Onnes faced was with the superconductors themselves. When a metal becomes superconducting, it produces, as do ordinary conductors, a magnetic field. Initially, when a superconductor is cooled below its transition temperature and a magnetic field is increased around it, the magnetic field remains around the superconductor. This can be easily demonstrated in the 

Two things, then, had to be done before there could be any major application of the newfound superconducting phenomenon. One was that new materials with higher transition temperatures had to be found. These materials would superconduct in ranges that were considered techni- 

So the hunt for new materials began, but this time the focus was not on lower temperatures, as Kamerlingh On-nes s had been, but on higher ones. It was not easy. The process required meticulous surveying of scores of elements and simple alloys, and even some nonmetallic systems, like aromatic compounds, a chemical grouping which 

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Quest Synthesis Technology. Quest 210 is designed for up to 20 reactions in 5-or 10-mL reaction vessels. Each of the 20 vessels can be efficiently stirred, heated, or cooled, and maintained under an inert atmosphere. Quest 205 is designed for synthesis on a large scale, with two banks of five 100-mL reaetion vessels. 

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