A superconductor is like an ideal highway with no traffic lights: electrons race along without hindrance. But apply a voltage, and the picture changes. In a new experiment, physicists found that an electric field penetrates the superconductor and creates a mixed regime inside.

In this unusual state, part of the current remains superconducting, while part dissipates energy like in a normal metal. All of this happens in a simple three-dimensional sample without microscopic patterns. The effect is caused by oscillations of the order parameter, the quantity that sets the strength of superconductivity, under the influence of the field.

This hybrid regime has become a testing ground for studying quantum fluids far from equilibrium. Previously, such behavior was only achieved in complex structures. Here, nature itself organized the coexistence of order and chaos.