Preprint Claims Ultrafast Lasers Can Create 'Programmable' Superconductivity at Aluminum–Silicon Interface

Researchers from Slovenia and collaborators have posted an arXiv preprint claiming they can create, erase and tune a superconducting state at an aluminum-silicon interface using ultrafast laser pulses.

If the result holds up, it would mark an unusually strong version of so-called light-induced superconductivity: not just a fleeting superconducting-like signal, but a phase-coherent state that the authors say can be programmed on demand and adjusted to different critical temperatures. But the work is still at an early stage. The paper has not been peer-reviewed, and there is no evidence yet of independent replication.

The preprint, titled “Phase coherence control of a programmable high-Tc superconductor created by light,” was posted to arXiv on July 16 as arXiv:2607.14567. It lists Viktoria Yursa, Igor Vaskivskyi and Dragan Mihailovic among its authors, several of whom are affiliated, according to institution pages and recent publications cited in the research report, with the Jožef Stefan Institute’s Department of Complex Matter and the CENN Nanocenter in Ljubljana, Slovenia.

In the paper’s abstract, the authors describe a “light-programmable superconducting (LiPS) state” at an aluminum-silicon heterojunction, meaning a layered interface between the two materials. They say the state can be “created and fully controlled with femtosecond laser pulses,” or bursts of light lasting quadrillionths of a second. According to the abstract, the claimed superconducting “critical temperatures — ranging from 1.8-8.5 K” can be increased or erased using tailored pulse sequences.

The preprint presents several lines of evidence that the authors interpret as signs of a genuine superconducting phase. According to the paper, the low-temperature state shows behavior consistent with a Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless, or BKT, transition, a hallmark often associated with two-dimensional superconducting systems. The authors also report a different regime above 2 kelvin with signatures they interpret as quantum phase disorder, as well as magnetic-field behavior they say matches vortex pinning and creep, where whirlpool-like magnetic structures appear to get trapped and move slowly inside a superconductor.

The paper further argues that the effect is tied to the structure of the aluminum-silicon interface itself. The authors attribute it to light-driven control of what they describe as a Moiré-like superlattice of misfit dislocations — a repeating defect pattern formed where mismatched crystal lattices meet. They say high-resolution electron microscopy shows that structure, along with “topologically protected soliton-like kinks,” which they propose help stabilize the state.

That combination of claims is what makes the preprint stand out. Optical control of superconductivity has been pursued for decades, and earlier high-profile reports — including work on a cuprate in 2011 and on K3C60 in 2016 — drew attention for possible superconducting signatures triggered by light. But the field has also seen repeated debates over how to interpret such signals, and researchers have generally treated the strongest claims with caution unless they are backed by multiple diagnostics and reproduced by other groups.

This new paper goes further than many earlier reports by asserting reversible control, tunable critical temperatures and microscopy evidence in a single system. It also explicitly frames the observations as evidence for a true zero-resistance, phase-coherent state. For now, though, that remains the authors’ claim in a preprint.

Several of the researchers are tied to Slovenia’s Jožef Stefan Institute and the CENN Nanocenter, according to the report and institutional material. As of this check, there was no sign of a peer-reviewed version, no independent replication and no institutional press release announcing a published paper. That leaves the work as an eye-catching and potentially important claim — one that still needs the scrutiny that comes with peer review and outside confirmation.