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EMIR Spectrograph Installed on Gran Telescopio CANARIAS

Engineers at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory have attached the EMIR spectrograph to the Gran Telescopio CANARIAS (GTC), realizing a more than decade long design and fabrication process. The cryogenic instrument was designed, built, assembled and verified entirely at the IAC (Astrophysics Institute of Canrias). It will produce images...

FAST Research Accelerator Reaches Design Beam Energy

In May, Fermilab sent an electron beam with an energy of 50 million electronvolts, or MeV, through the photoinjector at the Fermilab Accelerator Science and Technology facility (FAST), achieving a major design goal for the accelerator and marking the beginning of a new accelerator science program at the laboratory.

New Elements Named, Public Comment Sought

The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) has opened a five-month long public comment and review period of the names recommended for elements 113, 115, 117 and 118, the discoveries of which were announced late last year.

Scientists Use Frozen Argon to Boost Laser Light to New Extremes

Researchers at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University and Louisiana State University have achieved a dramatic high harmonic generation (HHG) shift by shining an infrared laser through argon gas that’s been frozen at 20 K into a thin, fragile solid whose atoms barely cling to each...

New Low-Defect Method to Nitrogen Dope Graphene Results in Tunable Bandstructure

An interdisciplinary team of scientists at the US Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) Electronics Science and Technology and Materials Science and Technology Divisions has demonstrated hyperthermal ion implantation (HyTII) as an effective means of substitutionally doping graphene—a hexagonally-arranged single-atomic thickness carbon sheet—with nitrogen atoms. The result is a low-defect film with...

SLAC Testing Prototype Dark Matter Detector

Prototyping of a new, ultrasensitive “eye” for dark matter is making rapid progress at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, according to researchers and engineers who have installed a small-scale version of the future LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) detector to test, develop and troubleshoot various aspects of its technology. When...

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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...

History of Cryogenics

From the Fall 1999 issue of Cold Facts magazine Millennium Breakthroughs A variety of CSA members give different perspectives on the past millennium: What were the most significant breakthroughs in cryogenics during the past millennium? Prof. R.G. Scurlock, Kryos Technology, scurlock@soton.ac.uk (“Breakthrough” = way through obstacles — Oxford English Dictionary)...

Cryobiology

Andreas Sputtek Past President Society for Cryobiology sputtek@uke.uni-hamburg.de or http://www.sputtek.de/. The word cryobiology (from the Greek words “cryo” = cold, “bios” = life, and “logos” = science) literally signifies the science of life at low temperatures. In practice, this field comprises the study of any biological material or system (e.g.,...

Cryogenic Insulation

James E. Fesmire Cryogenics Test Laboratory NASA Kennedy Space Center james.e.fesmire@nasa.gov Introduction In today’s world, the use of cryogenics and low-temperature refrigeration is taking a more and more significant role. From the food industry, transportation, energy, and medical applications to the Space Shuttle, cryogenic liquids must be stored, handled, and...

Cryogenic Treatment of Materials

F.J. Diekman Controlled Thermal Processing, Inc. info@metal-wear.com Cryogenic Processing (also called cryogenic treatment, and incorrectly “cryogenic tempering”) is a process that uses cryogenic temperatures to modify materials to enhance their performance. Cryogenic Processing involves the slow reduction in temperature of the material to at least -300°F (-185°C) and holding the...

An Issue of Pressure and Flow Rate in a Supply Tank

Please help solve this problem: A supply tank requires a vaporizer to generate sufficient pressure to pump stored fluid up into a vehicle or tank. The available head is limited as the tank level falls and it is important to minimize the system pressure drop to maintain the desired flow...

Using MLI on VJ Line Joints or Cryo Storage Tanks

When installing Multi Layer Insulation (MLI) blankets on VJ line joints or cryo storage tanks should they be wrapped and tied down tight or loose? These are usually pre-cut to size. Also should they have an access hole at the point of where the molecular sieve is installed to help...