Yuan Cao, a PhD student of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was named one of the 10 people who mattered in 2018 by Nature for discovering superconductivity from sheets of atom-thick carbon, and was praised as the “Graphene wrangler” [1]. Born in 1996, before Cao started his PhD study, he completed an undergraduate degree at the University of Science and Technology of China.
On March 5th, 2018 Nature published two papers of Prof. Jarillo-Herrero’s team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where Cao was the first author, together with a review article from Professor Eugene J. Mele at University of Pennsylvania.
Cao and his team discovered a special way of turning graphene into a superconductor－a material that conducts electricity without resistance [2]. They took two sheets of graphene exposed to a small electric field and cooled to 1.7K, placing one sheet of graphene over another, twisting one sheet to the ‘magic angle’ of ~1.1° [1, 3]. The bilayer then showed superconductivity similar to that of the Copper oxide, whose structure was hard to change and thus making it impossible for physicists to make further studies before.
Cao’s discovery surprised the nanoscience community and spurred a new field of physics [1, 2]. It paved the way for further exploration of the superconducting mechanism of Copper Oxide, and anticipated new possibilities for discovery of superconductor materials that might operate at room temperature. Now there are bunch of scientists trying to replicate Cao’s experiment and extent his research.
[1] YUAN CAO: Graphene wrangler, Nature’s 10
https://www.nature.com/immersive/d41586-018-07683-5/index.html
[2] Physics prodigy, 22, honored for discovery of 'magic angle', China Daily
https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/201812/20/WS5c1ad892a3107d4c3a001bf7.html
[3] How ‘magic angle’ graphene is stirring up physics, Nature
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-07848-2