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A ceramic plate as thin as a soap film, and through it flows current with zero resistance. That's the superconductivity achieved in nickelates, relatives of the famous cuprate superconductors. Previously, this required enormous pressure, comparable to that at the ocean floor. Now scientists have found a workaround: they grew the film on a crystalline substrate that squeezes it by 2.14%. The strain acts like a vise, forcing atoms into the right arrangement.

Under this strain, the film exhibits superconductivity already at 60 kelvins (minus 213°C) and loses all resistance at 33 K. Magnetic measurements confirmed that the superconducting layer is two-dimensional — current flows only in the plane of the film, like on infinitely smooth ice. But the real surprise was how the charges move. In crystals under pressure, current is carried by "holes"—positively charged vacancies left by electrons. Here it's the opposite: the carriers are electrons themselves. This fundamental difference suggests that strain and pressure, though leading to the same goal, affect the material in different ways.

So a 2.14% strain opens a new dimension for controlling superconductivity. Instead of squeezing a crystal from all sides, you can simply choose the right "foundation" for growing the film. Then a ceramic plate, resembling a piece of colored glass, becomes a lossless conductor, a bridge to energy-efficient technologies.