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Fundamental physics

Resistance of a perfect wire

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Intuition tells us that a wire without defects should have zero resistance. But in the real world all conductors, however perfect, have some resistance. A new study confirms that electrical contacts are the problem.

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Figure 1: Measuring resistance in one-dimensional wires.

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Correspondence to Albert M. Chang.

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Chang, A. Resistance of a perfect wire. Nature 411, 39–40 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/35075201

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