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FRIB Experiment Pushes Elements to the Limit

A new study led by the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has measured how long it takes for several kinds of exotic nuclei to decay. The paper, published today in Physical Review Letters, marks the first experimental result from the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB), a...

NASA Inflatable Heat Shield Finds Strength in Flexibility

How does something that looks like a stack of orange inner tubes covered in a black tarp survive temperatures reaching 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit as it plunges through the atmosphere? An upcoming technology demonstration uses advanced materials to make a heat shield that’s tougher than it looks. Hypersonic Inflatable Aerodynamic Decelerator...

Pilot Project Tests New High-Capacity Transmission Lines

VEIR, an early-stage technology company based in Woburn, Mass., is pioneering the first application of superconducting transmission over long distances, a key component to deliver renewable sources of energy safely and reliably from where it is generated to where it is needed, often cross-country. VEIR is teaming up with National...

Three Questions: Emre Gençer on the role of blue hydrogen in decarbonizing the world’s energy systems

In the past several years, hydrogen energy has increasingly become a more central aspect of the clean energy transition. Hydrogen can produce clean, on-demand energy that could complement variable renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. That being said, pathways for deploying hydrogen at scale have yet to...

Thermal Control Designs Keep Astronauts Cool on Space Station

For astronauts, staying cool and comfortable on China’s Tiangong space station is no problem. The station orbits Earth in about 90 minutes at an altitude of 400 km. It experiences large fluctuations in temperature, ranging from 150 degrees Celsius when the station is exposed to the sun to minus 100...

First Radio-Astronomy Cryogenic Receivers with All-Metal 3D-Printed RF Components

The NAOJ ALMA Project and Advanced Technology Center have successfully fabricated corrugated all-metal 3D-printed horns for the ALMA Band 1 receivers (Radio Frequency: 35-50 GHz). Since around 2015, the NAOJ ALMA Project and the Advanced Technology Center have been studying the applications of additive manufacturing (AM), which produces three-dimensional objects by...

Latest in Defining Cryogenics

Joule-Thomson Effect

The Joule-Thomson (JT) effect is a thermodynamic process that occurs when a fluid expands from high pressure to low pressure at constant enthalpy (an isenthalpic process). Such a process can be approximated in the real world by expanding a fluid from high pressure to low pressure across a valve. Under...

Current Leads

One of the challenges of using superconducting magnets is the connection of the magnet to a room temperature power supply. This is accomplished via current leads. The trick is that current leads should ideally have a low heat leak, since they connect room temperature to cryogenic temperature, while at the...

Multilayer Insulation

Multilayer insulation (also referred to as superinsulation) is a key component in the reduction of heat leak to cryogenic systems due to thermal radiation. MLI consists of a series of uncooled reflective surfaces placed in the vacuum space between two surfaces, one warmer than the other. Generally speaking, for ideal...

Latest in Cryo Central

Magnets

From “Superconductivity: Present and Future Applications” by the Coalition for the Commercial Application of Superconductors. Particle physics uses accelerators to recreate the conditions of the early universe in an attempt to piece together the complex puzzle of how we got to where we are today. These huge machines are used...

Energy Storage

From “Superconductivity: Present and Future Applications” by the Coalition for the Commercial Application of Superconductors. With power lines increasingly congested and prone to instability, strategic injection of brief bursts of real power can play a crucial role in maintaining grid reliability. Small-scale Superconducting Magnetic Energy Storage (SMES) systems, based on...

Astronomy

ASTRONOMY IN SPACE by Peter V. Mason, retired, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and Visiting Associate, California Institute of Technology. Pmason@alumni.caltech.edu In thinking about the reasons to perform astronomy in space, we first consider the effect of the earth’s atmosphere. On a scale of decreasing energy, gamma rays, cosmic rays, X-rays and...

Cryocoolers

What is a Cryocooler? A mechanism that can extract heat from an object (cooler) and by doing so draw its temperature down below approximately 150 Kelvin (cryo). — (Courtesy Dr. Willy Gully) What is the difference between a Cryocooler and a Cryostat? A cryostat is any device designed to maintain...

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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