Cold Facts Digital – The go-to place for Cryogenics and Superconductivity

The Robots of CERN

The LHC contains 120 tons of liquid helium kept at 1.9 K. And even with safety systems in place, engineers there prefer to limit underground access when the cryogenic systems are activated. Enter TIM—the Train Inspection Monorail. TIM is a chain of wagons, sensors and cameras that snake along a...

NASA Telescope Reveals Batch of Earth-size, Habitable-zone Planets around Single Star

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has revealed a new exoplanet discovery: the first known system of seven Earth-size planets around a single star. Three of these planets are firmly located in the habitable zone, the area around the parent star where a rocky planet is most likely to have liquid water.

Still Cooling after All These Years

Fifteen years is a long time for any high-tech cryogenic device to continue working, but that is just what an M77 cryocooler aboard NASA's RHESSI satellite has accomplished. Designed by Sunpower, Inc. (CSA CSM), the unit's piston has cycled over 26 billion times over this period. And, as periodic oil...

Cornell Professor Takes Home 2017 Lee Osheroff Richardson Science Prize

Oxford Instruments has awarded Dr. Brad Ramshaw, assistant professor at Cornell University, its 2017 LOR Science Prize. The Lee Osheroff Richardson (LOR) Science Prize promotes and recognizes the novel work of young scientists working in the fields of low temperatures or high magnetic fields in the Americas. The trophy and...

CSA Remembers Peter Gifford 1947 – 2017

We regret to report that Peter Gifford, longtime leader of Cryomech, Inc., passed away in January 2017, surrounded by family and friends at his Syracuse home. He was 68. Gifford was a leader in the cryogenic community, a dedicated member of CSA and one of the second-generation industry leaders affectionately...

CUORE Reaches Its Operating Temperature

The Cryogenic Underground Observatory for Rare Events experiment (CUORE) reached a new milestone in late January when its detector reached its operating temperature of 10 mk. The detector has 19 towers formed from 988 Tellurium oxide crystals, and it weighs nearly 1,650 lbs. Engineers finished installing the detector into the...

Latest in Defining Cryogenics

Helium-3

Helium-3 (3He) is one of the two stable isotopes of helium. The other is the much more common Helium-4 (4He). Neither of these isotopes should be confused with He II, which is the second liquid phase of 4He. He II was discussed in this column in the Spring 2010 edition...

Cryopumping

Cryopumping refers to the use of cryogenic temperatures to produce vacuum in enclosed spaces. More broadly, it can also refer to the removal of gases via cryogenic temperatures from a flow stream or enclosure without necessarily resulting in vacuum pressures. This is an important application of cryogenics and is used...

Thermal Acoustic Oscillations

Thermal Acoustic Oscillations (TAO) are a common event in cryogenic systems that can have significant adverse effects on the performance of the system. TAOs are sustained pressure oscillations that can occur in tubes containing gas, closed at one end (the warm end) that have a very large temperature gradient along...

Latest in Cryo Central

Air Separation and Liquefaction

by Nils Tellier, PE, President, EPSIM Corporation (CSA CSM) nils@epsim.us All illustrations courtesy EPSIM Corporation Background History of Air Separation and Liquefaction This section builds on a rich history of methods to develop deep refrigeration and cryogenic liquefaction during the 19th Century. You are encouraged to read Cryo Central’s History...

Bose-Einstein Condensate

A Bose-Einstein condensate, first proposed in 1925 by Albert Einstein based on work done by Satyendra Nath Bose (the same Bose from whom the term boson is derived), is a super-cold state of matter in which almost all of the individual atoms have “condensed” down to the lowest possible quantum...

Cold Technology for Pest Control

While it does not reach temperatures cold enough to be called cryogenic, carbon dioxide snow is at the heart of a new way of dealing with unwanted pests. It utilizes a quick freezing process that takes advantage of the properties of carbon dioxide snow and has a number of benefits...

Cryogenic Finishing

The following 3 articles discuss the uses and procedures of various type of cryogenic finishing. 1) By Robin A. Rhodes, Cryogenic Institute of New England, Inc. rrhodes@nitrofreeze.com Cryogenic Deflashing is employed to remove undesired residual mold flash that remains on molded parts after they are removed or ejected from the...

Latest in Ask the Experts

Cryogenic processing for medical equipment, mining industry

Greetings from Australia. I am looking for a company that I might contact that has any experience or has done any research into cryogenic processing for medical equipment, in particular, joint prosthesis.

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