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

DOE announces new accelerator stewardship funding opportunities

The US Department of Energy made available an estimated $4 million in grants on October 13 with a Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) for research opportunities associated with its Accelerator R&D Stewardship Program. Research funded under this FOA could lead to advances is High Energy Physics (HEP), but the grants are...

2015 Nobel Prize in Physics awarded to neutrino oscillation experimenters

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on October 6 awarded the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physics to Takaaki Kajita and Arthur B. McDonald in recognition of key contributions each made to experiments demonstrating neutrino oscillations. Physicists struggled for decades prior to Kajita's and McDonald's experiments to explain why up to...

CONCOA opens new facility in Taiwan

CONCOA has opened its second marketing facility and product support center in the Pacific region, an area the firm sees as strategic for investment and trade. Located in the greater Taipei area, the new facility supports business partners in China, Hong Kong, Japan, Macao, South Korea and Taiwan.

ITER superconductor production nears completion

The single largest superconductor procurement in industrial history is drawing to a successful close. An eight-year campaign to produce the superconductors for ITER's powerful magnet systems is in its final stages, with nearly 70 percent of the conductor units lengths accepted by the ITER Organization.

Fermilab powers up electromagnet dormant for a decade

Fermilab announced September 23 that scientists there have successfully brought a fragile, expensive and complex 17-ton electromagnet back to life, cooling it down to -450°F and then powering it up. The ring is the centerpiece of an experiment to probe the mysteries of the universe with subatomic particles called muons....

Magnolia LNG awards $40 million for liquefaction equipment

Magnolia LNG, a subsidiary company of Liquefied Natural Gas Limited, announced on September 22 that it had awarded $40 million in contracts to Chart Industries, Inc., for a mid-scale LNG project at Lake Charles LA. Chart will initially deliver two identical trains, each with a nominal LNG production capacity of...

Latest in Defining Cryogenics

Mixed Refrigerant Cycles

Most cryogenic refrigeration systems, both large scale systems and cryocoolers, use helium as a working fluid. There are a number of advantages to helium, not the least of which is that helium remains a fluid down to the lowest achievable temperatures. In order to freeze helium, pressures of over 20...

Fountain Pumps and He II Phase Separators

Helium II (He II), the second liquid phase of the 4He isotope described in this column in Cold Facts Spring 2010 (http://2csa.us/he2), can be modeled as consisting of two interpenetrating fluids. One, the superfluid component, has zero viscosity and entropy and the other, the normal fluid component, has nonzero viscosity...

Turboexpanders

A vital technology in the refrigerators and liquefiers described in Cold Facts Volume 31 Number 3 is that of turboexpanders. These devices are rotating machines in which the process fluid (e.g., helium) does work against the turboexpander while moving from high pressure to a lower pressure and thus is cooled....

Latest in Cryo Central

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...

Latest in Ask the Experts

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...

Separated layers of ice over a pipe

I want to know that why there are different layers of ice over a pipe carrying a cryogenic fluid, each layer separated with clear marks / lines? What do these layers signify?

Using nitrogen as a cryogen

Is it possible to achieve -200˚C using nitrogen as a cryogen?

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