100 Years of Superconductivity

"Preface Superconductivity came as a big surprise. But more amazing perhaps is that even hundred years after its discovery this peculiar phenomenon continues to bring us new surprises. The research of superconductivity is characterized by times of relative quietness, interrupted by periods of exciting activities, often preceded by fundamental breakthroughs that later won Nobel Prizes in physics or chemistry. "Fundamental" can in this case both relate to an emerging theoretical insight and to a new class of materials displaying entirely unforeseen properties. In both cases, the prospect of new applications has been an important drive for commercial ambitions. In meantime applications of superconductivity have found its place in science and industry; just like superconductivity in general, there were periods of quiet progress and stormy phases-but overall a steady progress took place, e.g., high-Tc superconductors were judged in the beginning as "never applicable in high magnetic fields" because of their grain boundary problem. In the meantime they are essential building blocks for the creation of very high permanent fields: the result of excellent ideas and the cooperation between fundamental and applied scientists. Superconducting magnets for MRI can be found in any major hospital, and high-energy physics without superconducting magnets is practically unthinkable. A similar breathtaking development took place in superconducting electronics: quantum-limited detectors, quantum information processing, MEG and MCG, high-speed computing, and analog-todigital and digital-to-analog converters with quantum precision, incorporating 10,000's of Josephson junctions, are available. It seems only to be a question of time (and cooling) until they will enter the industrial product cycl"--