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

First LHC magnets prepped for restart

One-eighth of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) dipole magnets have reached the energy they'll need to operate in 2015. Engineers at CERN powered 154 superconducting magnets to a current of around 11,000 amps. This is about 1,000 times greater than an average household appliance and is required to make the...

Save the Date for the 2015 Space Cryogenics Workshop

NASA Glenn Research Center announces the 2015 Space Cryogenics Workshop (SCW), a division of the Cryogenic Society of America. All aspects of space cryogenics will be represented, with an emphasis on work related to previous missions as well as future research.

CSA Board Certifies Newly Elected Directors

At the August 14 CSA Board meeting held during the Applied Superconductivity Conference in Charlotte NC, the four directors recently elected by the society's membership were certified.

Superconductivity: Will It Be Coming in from the Cold?

Dr. Paul Michael Grant assesses the application of superconductivity within the electric power sector, asking, "Is there a 'hot track' upward for both applications of today's superconductors and future transition temperatures beyond 200K as well?"

ASC Attendees Spend Event-Filled Week

This year’s Applied Superconductivity Conference, ASC14, hosted 1,523 attendees from 36 countries, with 791 papers submitted for peer review. Held at the Charlotte NC Convention Center, August 10-15, the event’s theme was “Race to Energy Efficiency,” incorporating the racecar theme of its proximity to the NASCAR Hall of Fame, which...

Historical Retrospective: CSA’s Birth in the Early Days of the Space Age

We’ve always heard that CSA began in 1964 with the growing need for cryogenics in the burgeoning Space Age. We decided to take a look at the unfolding of this phenomenon in the pages of Cryogenic Technology, “the Journal of the Cryogenic Society of America,” Volume 1, 1964-1965.

Latest in Defining Cryogenics

Liquid Hydrogen

Hydrogen becomes a liquid at 20K and 1 bar. Liquid hydrogen (LH2) is an important substance in industry, transportation and research. Industrial uses of hydrogen include applications in the electronics, glass, chemical and metal processing fields. In these applications, the hydrogen is generally used as a room temperature gas but...

Superconducting Radiofrequency Cavities

Superconducting radio frequency (SRF) cavities represent an important application of cryogenics and superconductivity. SRF cavities are a technology for accelerating charged particle beams via the transfer of radiofrequency (RF) energy to the beams via resonant structures. As such, they are frequently found in large particle accelerators used for scientific research....

Thermal Radiation Shields

Actively cooled thermal radiation shields are a common feature of cryostats whose lowest temperature is less than 77K. These shields, which typically operate at temperatures between that of LN2 and 40K, block thermal radiation from higher temperatures from reaching lower temperature cryogenic components or fluids. Since the heat radiated from...

Latest in Cryo Central

Food Processing

Cryogenics and Food The industrial gas industry provides a host of products and services related to food. The various gases have useful and sometimes fascinating applications in food industry. “The food industry is not a homogenous industry. The needs of customers processing hamburger vs. poultry vs. strawberries vs. seafood, for...

Primary Standards

Elie K. Track Hypres, Inc. elie@hypres.com http://www.hypres.com/ Primary standards involve the exact definition and realization of units of measurement for various quantities, time, length, mass, voltage, resistance, current, etc. International agreements based on the latest scientific knowledge define those units, and their realizations vary depending on the unit itself. For...

Shrink Fitting

Robin A. Rhodes Cryogenic Institute of New England, Inc. rrhodes@nitrofreeze.com Shrink fitting, (or “compression fitting” as it is sometimes called), is a method used to insert a pin or bushing into a housing or other assembly requiring an extremely tight tolerance fit. It can be used as an alternative to...

Telecommunications

From the Winter 2004 issue of Cold Facts magazine The recent M-Calc IV — 4th Industry Assessment workshop discussing military and commercial applications for low-cost cryocoolers, held in November in San Diego, highlighted progress being made in cryogenics as applied in telecommunications. The reliability and long lifetime of projects now...

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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