David Graf

A magnetic field of 8 tesla is 200 times stronger than Earth's field. Under such a field, superconductivity in a thin film of palladium ditelluride not only survives but persists down to 20 millikelvin, which is a hundred times colder than outer space. For comparison, a thick film of the same material has a critical field 80 times smaller.

The CrSb crystal behaves like an intersection where electrons with different spins choose different lanes. In a conventional magnet, all electrons align in one direction, but in an altermagnet, spins alternate like squares on a chessboard. This creates a complex map of velocities that is hard to see directly.