Attraction Between Electron Pairs in High Temperature Superconductors

It is proposed that in high temperature superconductors Cooper pairs form and condense due to the monotonic-oscillatory transition in the pair potential of mean force, which occurs quite generally at high coupling in charge systems. It is shown that the predicted transition temperatures are broadly in line with measured superconducting transition temperatures for reasonable values of the total electron density and the residual dielectric permittivity arising from the immobile electrons. The predicted transition is independent of the isotopic masses of the solid. Consequent design principles for high temperature superconductors are discussed.