Buffalo State College Physics Department faculty members received a $275,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy for a three-year period beginning August 2003 to conduct basic research into superconductive materials. The college provided an additional $30,000 in matching funds.

Professor Michael J. De Marco and Assistant Professor Dermot Coffey received the grant, entitled “99Ru Mossbauer Effect Investigations of Superconductivity and Magnetic Ruthenates and the Development of 191 Pt as a Mossbauer Source.”

De Marco and Coffey will conduct their research under very cold conditions: 4 degrees Kelvin, which is about minus 453 degrees Fahrenheit. Their research will use the Mossbauer effect to study the properties of superconducting ruthenates, and will take place in part at the University at Buffalo. The Mossbauer effect is a research technique that uses emissions from the nuclei of atoms to study substances. Ruthenates are compounds that enable scientists to explore fundamental concepts about superconductivity.

Superconductivity holds great promise for meeting future energy needs if scientists discover a way for materials to be superconductive at room temperature.

Already, superconductive materials are used in medicine and transportation, including magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and the Yamanashi Maglev Test Line, an experimental railroad in Japan that uses superconductivity for high-speed transport.

“We’re at the beginning stages,” said De Marco. De Marco will concentrate on collecting and measuring data; Dermot, a theorist, will develop computer models to analyze the data. The grant contains funding for undergraduate students each year, which will enable students to acquire knowledge “while contributing to…experimental and theoretical physics,” according to the proposal.