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MIT News
Graphene can hold multiple states of superconductivity, a new study finds
Graphene can hold multiple states of superconductivity, a new study finds
What’s more, the superconducting states get stronger under conditions expected to kill them.
Jennifer Chu<br>MIT News
Publication Date:
June 29, 2026
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Caption:
This graphic illustrates three different ways that electrons can pair up and flow through rhombohedral pentalayer graphene without resistance. The three different superconducting states (represented by different colors) surprisingly persist, and can even be boosted in a magnetic field, which normally kills superconductivity.
Credits:
Credit: Amy Pan, RLE
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The research team includes members of Ju’s lab at MIT. Picture from left to right are graduate students Shenyong Ye and Junseok Seo, and Associate Professor Long Ju.
Credits:
Credit: Sampson Wilcox, RLE
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Caption:
This graphic illustrates three different ways that electrons can pair up and flow through rhombohedral pentalayer graphene without resistance. The three different superconducting states (represented by different colors) surprisingly persist, and can even be boosted in a magnetic field, which normally kills superconductivity.
Credits:
Credit: Amy Pan, RLE
Caption:
The research team includes members of Ju’s lab at MIT. Picture from left to right are graduate students Shenyong Ye and Junseok Seo, and Associate Professor Long Ju.
Credits:
Credit: Sampson Wilcox, RLE
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The ordinary graphite in pencil lead is proving to be surprisingly multifaceted at the microscale.<br>In a study appearing today in the journal Nature, MIT researchers report that a certain microscopic structure found in natural graphite can host multiple superconducting states. Superconductivity is an electronic state of matter in which electrons pair up and glide through a material with zero resistance.<br>While there are thousands of materials that are known to be superconductors, it is rare for one material to host multiple forms of superconductivity.<br>The researchers discovered the multiple superconducting states in atomically thin exfoliations of graphite, known as graphene. Specifically, graphene is a single-atom-thin sheet of carbon atoms arranged precisely in a microscopic lattice. The team made its discoveries in samples of rhombohedral graphene, which is a natural structure within graphite consisting of a stack of four or five graphene layers.<br>Interestingly, the researchers found that several of the new superconducting states in rhombohedral graphene are able to persist in the presence of a magnetic field, which normally kills superconductivity.<br>And in a further surprise, these superconducting states even get stronger when exposed to a magnetic field.<br>Overall, the findings reveal a new family of unconventional superconducting states in one seemingly simple material.<br>“People might assume that this is a simple, boring carbon material,” says Long Ju, the Lawrence C. and Sarah W. Biedenharn Associate Professor of Physics at MIT. “But we can control this material by tuning certain experimental ‘knobs,’ such as electrical voltages. This is how a simple physical material can exhibit so many different superconducting properties.”<br>It’s still unclear exactly how each of the multiple...