From sustainable energy to quantum computers: high-temperature superconductors have the potential to revolutionize today's technologies. Despite intensive research, however, we still lack the necessary basic understanding to develop these complex materials for widespread application. "Higgs spectroscopy" could bring about a watershed as it reveals the dynamics of paired electrons in superconductors. An international research consortium centered around the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) and the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research (MPI-FKF) is now presenting the new measuring method in the journal Nature Communications. Remarkably, the dynamics also reveal typical precursors of superconductivity even above the critical temperature at which the materials investigated attain superconductivity.
