Absolute 0 is -273.16 C which is -459.7 F. Therefore to the nearest degree they should be saying that absolute 0 is -460 F rather than -459 F.

And it goes on from there. For instance not all conductors become superconductors, just many metals. And they don't do it at absolute 0, but rather a few degrees above.

But yes, this result is very interesting. Here is some background about what it could mean.

Now switching into Kelvin, here is the scoop. Absolute 0 is 0 K. Freezing is 273 K. A cool room is 290 K.

The first superconductor discovered was mercury at 4 K. The best pure metal was lead about 7 K. In the 50's and 60's it was discovered that some compounds could do a lot better than that. Some of them into the 20's K. Prior to 1986, that was it. You couldn't study superconductors without a specialized lab. You couldn't use them without very specialized cooling equipment.

In 1986 we discovered ceramic superconductors. The first one was at 35 K. Within a couple of years we were at 120 K, and this class topped out at 125 K. This is important. It means that anyone who can put their hands on liquid nitrogen (which is mass produced and stored in thermos containers) can play with superconductivity. This is warm enough for industrial applications like magnetically levitated trains.

Of course it still isn't even half-way to room temperature.

Now if I can trust translating their numbers back to Kelvin, this discovery is only about 117 K - not as good as existing ceramics. But the key is that this is the second class of compound that we can get above 77 K (so liquid nitrogen is sufficient to cool it) and we have no idea where this class of compounds is going to hit its limit. From what it sounds like, they have pretty good ideas on what they need to do to improve it. It might not do as well as ceramics. It might be able to get a lot hotter. It will have different physical properties, so it may be usable some places that ceramics are not.

And if we can get 2 classes of compound up to this temperature, then we have more ideas to try to get a third class going.

In other words, this discovery is already commercially useful, and we haven't ruled out the holy grail of it leading to a major industrial revolution. Certainly it is the best prospect of room temperature superconductivity that we have seen in the last 10 years...

Cheers,
Ben