It’s been nearly 22 year since Back to the Future 2 hit the big screen. And since then, we’ve dreamed of the day when we could step foot upon our very own hoverboard. Well, folks, that day has finally arrived, and it looks… well, it looks a little bit ridiculous, to be honest.
Created by science students at Paris Diderot University, this hoverboard appears to use quantum levitation to float above the ground — something DT‘s very own Jeff Van Camp totally saw coming. Quantum levitation works by cooling a superconductor to a temperature of at least -301 degrees Fahrenheit with the help of some liquid nitrogen. When placed near a magnet, the magnetic field becomes trapped within the super-cold superconductor, which holds the superconductor in place.
Now, we have to say, this hoverboard isn’t exactly what we had in mind. We’re thinking more cruising down the street, or over a lake, not standing awkwardly in a room while everyone waits for us to screw up. Also, in our fantasies, our hoverboard doesn’t have a chimney. Weird, we know. But that’s just how we envision it.
Still, this is one of the best working prototypes we’ve ever seen. If only we could get the Department of Transportation to embed magnets in all the roads and sidewalks, and then set up vats of liquid nitrogen ever 15 feet or so, then perhaps we’d really be on to something.
Either that, or we can just wait a bit longer, and perhaps science will invent something closer to the hoverboard of our dreams.
