Synthesis of Oxide Superconductors

From the discovery of oxide superconductors in 1964, there were frequent indications that these materials are metastable. This lack of thermodynamic stability has now become one of the predominant issues in the synthesis of the high‐temperature superconductors. Once prepared, metastable superconductors possess sufficient kinetic stability that we generally need have no concern that they will decompose into more stable phases that are not superconducting. Nonetheless, our understanding of the issues relating to the stability of the known superconductors greatly influences our approaches to synthesizing them. Furthermore, understanding the relationship between instabilities and the mechanism of high‐$Tc$ superconductivity could be the key to the synthesis of superconductors with even higher critical temperatures.