A Mobius Strip Track For Superconductor Levitation

Superconductors are interesting things, though we don’t really rely on them for much in our day to day lives. They’d be supremely useful, if only they didn’t need to be so darned cold. While the boffins toil away in the lab on that problem however, there’s still some fun to be had, as demonstrated by the Möbius Strip levitation track at Ithaca College.  (Video, embedded below.)

The rig takes advantage of the fact that superconductors can levitate over magnets, and vice versa. This is due to flux pinning, wherein flux “tubes” from the magnet’s field penetrate a superconductor and are pinned in place by currents in the superconductor. It’s an awe-inpsiring effect, with the superconducting material appearing to magically float at a locked height above the magnetic surface, quite distinct from traditional magnetic levitation.

Construction of the track wasn’t straightforward. Early attempts at producing a Möbius Strip twisted through 540 degrees were unsuccessful in steel. The team then switched tack, using a flexible plastic which was much more pliable. This was then covered in neodymium magnets to create the necessary field, and the resulting visual effect is one of a silver-bricked magnetic road.

It’s a great display, and one that quite intuitively demonstrates the concepts of both a Möbius Strip and superconducting levitation. If room-temperature semiconductors become a real thing, there’s every possibility this could become an always-on installation. It’s also the trick behind one of the coolest hoverboards we’ve ever seen. Video after the break.