Clathrate metal superhydrides under high-pressure conditions: enroute to room-temperature superconductivity

The preface: Toward higher-T c superconductivity under lower pressure-from binary to ternary superhydrides

This is the Preface to Special Topic: Challenges to Achieving Room-Temperature Superconductivity in Superhydrides under Pressure.

Layered Hydride LiH4 with a Pressure-Insensitive Superconductivity

For hydride superconductors, each significant advance is built upon the discovery of novel H-based structural units, which in turn push the understanding of the superconducting mechanism to new heights. Based on first-principles calculations, we propose a metastable LiH4 with a wavy H layer composed of the edge-sharing pea-like H18 rings at high pressures. Unexpectedly, it exhibits pressure-insensitive superconductivity manifested by an extremely small pressure coefficient (dTc/dP) of 0.04 K/GPa. This feature is attributed to the slightly weakened electron-phonon coupling with pressure, caused by the reduced charge transfer from Li atoms to wavy H layers, significantly suppressing the substantial increase in the contribution of phonons to Tc. Its superconductivity originates from the strong coupling between the H 1s electrons and the high-frequency phonons associated with the H layer. Our study extends the list of H-based structural units and enhances the in-depth understanding of pressure-related superconductivity.