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Fermilab scientist receives DOE Early Career Research Program award

Alex Romanenko, a materials scientist at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, will receive $2.5 million from the Department of Energy’s Office of Science to expand his innovative research to develop superconducting accelerator components.

Dr. Larry Masur joins Bruker Energy & Supercon Technologies

Dr. Larry Masur has been appointed Vice President of Business Development, North America at Bruker Energy & Supercon, a developer and manufacturer of advanced superconducting materials and devices.

NASA Telescopes face budget crisis

As the Space Shuttle made its final flight, another arm of the US space program faces a bleak future.

Dippin’ Dots reacts to the marketplace

Would you like your coffee regular, black or pelletized? The question is important to the makers of Dippin’ Dots, those supercold beads of ice cream that are sold largely at ballparks and amusement parks and have become a staple of childhood summers.

CERN/ITER collaboration rescues Japanese magnet project

The iter newsline reports that when the March 2011 earthquake that devastated Japan dramatically disrupted a quality control step in the manufacturing process of the superconducting wires for the ITER magnets, swift action by CERN allowed the verification process to proceed.

US ITER SC magnet contract goes to General Atomics

The US ITER Project Office at Oak Ridge National Laboratory competitively awarded a multi-year contract to General Atomics to produce superconducting magnets for the central solenoid of ITER, an experimental fusion facility that aims to demonstrate the feasibility of fusion energy for the commercial power grid.

Latest in Defining Cryogenics

Cold Compressors

A common way to provide cooling below the normal boiling point of helium (4.2K) is to reduce the pressure above the bath of liquid helium, thus also reducing the bath’s equilibrium saturation temperature. For example, to produce a 1.8K bath of liquid helium, the saturation pressure has to be reduced...

Kapitza Conductance

Kapitza conductance refers to the heat transfer between a solid surface and a fluid that covers that surface. Fundamentally, it describes the inherent difficulty in transferring energy from a solid to the fluid covering the solid surface. This phenomenon was first observed by P. L. Kapitza in 1941 while studying...

Thermosyphons

A thermosyphon (or thermosiphon) is a device that transfers heat via natural convection in a fluid. The natural convection is driven by gravity with the colder, denser fluid flowing downhill and the warmer, less dense fluid flowing back up. Thus, thermosyphons connect an object to be cooled with a reservoir...

Latest in Cryo Central

Cryogenic Electronics

Randall Kirschman, consulting physicist, Mountain View, California ExtElect@gmail.com Cryogenic electronics—the operation of electronic devices, circuits, and systems at cryogenic temperatures—has been a valuable technology for decades. Cryogenic electronics (also referred to as low-temperature electronics, or cold electronics) can be based on semiconductive devices, on superconductive devices, or on a combination...

Particle Physics: High Energy Physics

Cryogenics and High-Energy Physics 1. From symmetry magazine: http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/cms/?pid=1000627: Cryogenics is the study of how materials behave at temperatures near absolute zero. In high-energy particle accelerators, such frigid temperatures reduce the electrical resistance of wires in superconducting magnets, increasing the magnet strength and allowing faster particle acceleration. The same holds...

HTS Degaussing Systems

From the Spring 2009 issue of Cold Facts (Volume 25, Number 2): Thanks to a joint project by the US Navy and a number of industry partners, high temperature superconducting (HTS) technology is now at the heart of an advanced degaussing system aboard the USS Higgins at the naval station...

Magnetic Resonance Imaging

From http://www.superconductors.org: An area where superconductors can perform a life-saving function is in the field of biomagnetism. Doctors need a non-invasive means of determining what’s going on inside the human body. By impinging a strong superconductor-derived magnetic field into the body, hydrogen atoms that exist in the body’s water and...

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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