Ryan Lee Rose Hills
Doping a 2D Mott Insulator
Some of the biggest technological hurdles come from the existence of electrical resistance in everyday materials, causing a waste of energy. High-temperature superconductivity is a great solution to this problem. High-temperature superconductors can conduct electricity without dissipating any energy and possess many special magnetic properties, making them useful for long distance power transmission, power storage, transportation, and magnetic medical imaging. However, the currently best high-temperature superconductors still require cryogenic temperatures to be superconducting, making them cost inefficient. Explaining the cause for their behavior has perplexed scientists for many decades, and understanding the phenomenon will lessen the drawbacks in their use and be a great leap for science and technology. To help accomplish this, I plan to study a class of closely related materials called Mott insulators, which are very often high-temperature superconductors, indicating a connection between the two. Establishing this link will help explain high-temperature superconductivity, which will in turn allow for the creation of new high-temperature superconductors and possibly room temperature superconductors.
Message To Sponsor
I would like to thank the Rose Hills Foundation for funding our research. The entire SURF experience was amazing, and we got some very nice results. Without the funding, we couldn't have discovered a potentially new kind of material as well as seen a very interesting temperature dependence of correlated physics. This research experience has made me more certain that I want to do scientific research in the future, and has solidified the path that I want to take to make a difference in the world.