Maybe the likening of superconductors and the cuprates resistance behavior is a clue.
Entirely speculative, but a larger scale analogy that I can relate to is a set of long pipes that fit together fairly well.
At low temperatures their entanglement (interaction with the rest of the universe) diminishes and they densify into a kind of crystalline arrangement that facilitates fairly unimpeded transfer of whatever energy flow really is; be it electrons, waves, or shifts of field energy in some form outside of my non-expert understanding.
At higher temperatures the material starts to jiggle, to expand, and to not quite align as well because everything's further apart and not quite right. This also causes more of the material to interact with energy that would have passed through at superconductive temperatures.
Maybe the packed pipes analogy is too far. A crystalline lattice where the interconnection between the components offers gaps could behave similarly in 3D space, or whatever N-dimension space might exist if that's something not just in science fiction.
Reflecting further, the densely packed (near absolute zero) conditions might also allow the 'strange material' to transition to a different sort of phase of matter. A state where individual components are packed together so tightly that they cease behaving as the groups we normally model and instead are interchangeable / intermingled with their neighbors. The electrons / waves could join the collective and dislodge a similar composition of material at a 'lower pressure'/'relief of potential' point.
Entirely speculative, but a larger scale analogy that I can relate to is a set of long pipes that fit together fairly well.
At low temperatures their entanglement (interaction with the rest of the universe) diminishes and they densify into a kind of crystalline arrangement that facilitates fairly unimpeded transfer of whatever energy flow really is; be it electrons, waves, or shifts of field energy in some form outside of my non-expert understanding.
At higher temperatures the material starts to jiggle, to expand, and to not quite align as well because everything's further apart and not quite right. This also causes more of the material to interact with energy that would have passed through at superconductive temperatures.
Maybe the packed pipes analogy is too far. A crystalline lattice where the interconnection between the components offers gaps could behave similarly in 3D space, or whatever N-dimension space might exist if that's something not just in science fiction.
Reflecting further, the densely packed (near absolute zero) conditions might also allow the 'strange material' to transition to a different sort of phase of matter. A state where individual components are packed together so tightly that they cease behaving as the groups we normally model and instead are interchangeable / intermingled with their neighbors. The electrons / waves could join the collective and dislodge a similar composition of material at a 'lower pressure'/'relief of potential' point.