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EASITrain to Hire, Fund PhD Candidates in Superconductivity and Related Fields

CERN has announced its European Advanced Superconductivity Innovation and Training project (EASITrain), a four-year initiative that brings together leading research institutes and industrial partners to train the next generation of researchers. It will cover the development of 15 Early Stage Researchers (ESRs) on projects related to superconducting wires, superconducting thin...

Electronic Symmetry Breaking Common in Superconducting Materials in High Magnetic Fields

Researchers from the Los Alamos National Laboratory report that the phenomenon of electronic symmetry breaking is common in superconducting materials in high magnetic fields. Using transport measurements near the field-tuned quantum critical point of CeRhIn5 at 50 Tesla, the researchers observed a fluctuating nematic-like state in which the material’s electrons...

UA Researchers to Design New Cryogenic Focal Plane Arrays

The American Institute for Manufacturing Integrated Photonics (AIM Photonics), a public-private partnership advancing the nation’s photonics manufacturing capabilities, has chosen a University of Arizona research team to design, fabricate and test new PIC-based datalinks for cryogenic focal plane array (FPA) readout. The project, according to AIM Photonics, has the potential...

SQUID Detector Reaches New Sensitivity Levels

Investigators at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a new sensor-array-based instrument that offers ultralow noise detection of small amounts of energy for a number of applications. The new device permits the collection of data from many more detectors than...

NASA Readies Multiple Balloon Program Experiments

NASA's balloon program is currently preparing new missions bearing sensitive instruments, including one designed to investigate the birth of our universe and another with ballooning origins that will fly on the International Space Station.

ICARUS Arrives at Fermilab, Greeted by Familiar Face

The ICARUS detector ended its journey across the Atlantic on July 26, arriving by semi-truck at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. Waiting for it there was Angela Fava, an experimental physicist who first worked with the machine in 2006, tightening bolts and connecting cables while an undergrad in Italy. In...

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Refrigerators and Liquefiers

Two of the most common terms used in cryogenics are “refrigerator” and “liquefier.” These terms describe similar and, as will be seen, in some cases identical components. A refrigerator provides cooling (that is, absorbs heat) at cryogenic temperatures. Refrigerators typically put a working fluid (such as helium) through one of...

Air Separation

Air separation is one of the largest, as well as earliest, industrial applications of cryogenics. In this process, cryogenic temperatures are used to separate air into its constituent gases: nitrogen (78.08%), oxygen (20.95%), argon (0.93%) and carbon dioxide (0.3%). Trace gases such as krypton, neon, xenon and helium total far...

Coefficient of Performance and Figure of Merit

The coefficient of performance (COP) is used to describe the effectiveness of refrigerators, including those operating at cryogenic temperatures. The COP is defined as the amount of heat removed at the cryogenic operating temperature of the refrigerator divided by the amount of work that must be applied to remove the...

Wind Tunnels

Dr. Robert Kilgore The development of the cryogenic wind tunnel is one of many significant breakthroughs in both cryogenics and wind-tunnel technology made during the past millennium. Interest in the development of high-speed commercial and military aircraft resulted in a review of problems of flow simulation in transonic wind tunnels...

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...

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...