Binghamton University physics professor Pegor Aynajian sits in his office amid piles of papers riddled with formulas, describing the isolated chamber where he conducts experiments to break down and improve long-standing physics theories regarding superconductors. His goal is to find out how they can change the approach to green energy.

“If we understand them, we will have the potential to building or designing a superconductor which will work at room temperature,” Aynajian said. “That will be a revolution.”

Aynajian began to study superconductors, which are materials that can transport electricity without any resistance, as a postdoctoral fellow at Princeton University in 2009. He examined electrons in these materials through the scanning tunneling microscope (STM) that observes at atoms, rather than cells.

In 2013 he came to BU as a professor. He explained that what drew him to the University was its reputation as a leading center for generating smart energy. Aynajian joined the physics department to further study superconductors and build his own STM.

Aynajian aims to build a superconductor that does not require freezing temperatures to function. If superconducting can occur at room temperature, the materials can transmit green energy — which is energy composed of natural substances — without having to artificially modify them. Freezing superconductors also leaves the materials with less potential to conduct, thereby wasting energy.

“Superconductors work at very low temperatures, so you have to cool your sample metal to around absolute zero,” Aynajian said. “It’s not very useful for every day application, and it costs a lot of money.”

By sending out an email to graduate physics students, he compiled a team of eight students — three graduates and five undergraduates — at the University to build an STM and conduct experiments to analyze electrons and atom patterns found in sample superconductive materials.

For the past year and a half, precautions had to be taken before the STM was completed: The sample surfaces had to be in an ultra-vacuumed space so as to not cause air exposure, all supplies had to be sterilized, the materials cooled down and the lab environment had to be still and silent.

“Just having students walk outside causes a lot of vibration that can break the experiment,” Aynajian said.

The team would use the STM to study the surface of high-temperature superconductors, composed of copper and oxygen that have a slightly higher temperature than others, which were discovered 30 years ago and still have much unknown about how they work.

Justin Leshen, a third-year doctoral candidate studying physics and a member of the team, said they were studying different types of materials in their experiments.

“The two major steps in this were being able to scan and visualize individual atoms on the surface of graphite in normal conditions, and more recently scanning the surface of copper,” Leshen said.

Bruce White, the head of the physics department, said Aynajian’s research could profoundly impact common understanding of electron patterns, as well as possibly improve the curriculum of students studying physics at the University.

“Access to the state of the art laboratory that Prof. Aynajian and his students are creating will offer significantly enhanced research opportunities to students in the department,” he wrote in an email. “As more discoveries are made by Prof. Aynajian and his students, new research directions will emerge that produce additional research opportunities for students at the university.”