Number 121 (Story #2), March 31, 1993 by Phillip F. Schewe and Ben Stein A MERCURY-BARIUM COPPER OXIDE SUPERCONDUCTOR , developed by a Moscow State-Grenoble-AT&T team of scientists, has a transition temperature of 94 K. This does not improve upon thallium compounds, but because the new mercury material's crystallography is simpler---it has only a single intermediate HgO layer and only a single superconducting CuO layer per unit cell---it may be more useful technologically (and possible better able to thrive in the presence of large magnetic fields) than the other copper oxide superconductors. (S. N. Putilin et al., Nature 18 March 1993.)