ADVERTISEMENT

ASC 2016 Highlights Progress in Superconductivity

Over 1,600 researchers and engineers from 36 countries gathered in Denver September 4-9 for ASC 2016, attending plenaries, poster sessions and meetings under the watchful gaze of the Colorado Convention Center’s Blue Bear. Celebrating its 50th year, the conference covered a wide range of topics, from superconducting electronics detectors and...

2016 ASC Best Student Paper Contest

The Applied Superconductivity Conference's Best Student Paper Contest recognizes outstanding presentations made at ASC by full-time students. The ability to describe one’s research, by succinctly capturing key results and ideas in written form as well as by presenting and defending the work in front of an audience of experts, is...

After 50 Years of ASC and Magnet Conductors, What’s Next?

Past and present superconducting magnet technology suggests that cheap, strong, available-by-the-ton Nb-Ti alloy conductors will always be used unless it’s absolutely necessary to use another superconducting material. In this decade “absolutely necessary” has taken on a clearer definition, thanks to ITER, the upgrade of LHC, 1 GHz NMR magnets, the...

Laser Powered Cryocooling Drops to 91 K

Over the last couple of decades researchers around the world have been working on optical refrigeration, a new solid-state cooling scheme based on light-matter interactions, and a team of researchers from the University of New Mexico (UNM) and ThermoDynamic Films, LLC (TDF) is currently working to harness the physics of...

Testing JWST’s MIRI Cooler Compressor Assembly

The James Webb Space Telescope’s (JWST) Mid InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) cooler subsystem features a closed cycle helium Joule-Thomson (JT) cryocooler pre-cooled by a three-stage pulse tube cryocooler. In this paper, researchers from Northrop Grumman discuss tests conducted on the CCA, a flight model sub-assembly that compresses and precools MIRI's helium...

Cryogenic System to Cool Malaysian Data Center

An international consortium has announced plans to construct a green data center that features liquid submersion cooling at a location in Malaysia's Klang Valley. The project aims to increase the sustainability of data centers by changing the way facilities are cooled, therein reducing energy consumption by up to 50 percent,...

ADVERTISEMENT

Dewar

A dewar is a type of cryostat named after Sir James Dewar, the researcher who first developed the concept of a vacuum insulated container with silvered walls to reflect thermal radiation. Dewar was the first to liquefy hydrogen, and he created the device to store his discovery. The thermos bottle...

Stirling and Gifford-McMahon Cryocoolers

Stirling and Gifford-McMahon (GM) cryocoolers are two of the most commonly used cryocoolers in cryogenics. Both devices have a significant industrial base and operate at a wide range of temperatures and capacities. The thermodynamic cycles for both of these cryocoolers are quite similar. The Stirling cycle consists of a compressor,...

Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG)

A significant commercial application of cryogenics is the liquefaction, transport and storage of natural gas. Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) is generally 95 percent methane with a few percent ethane and much lower concentrations of propane and butane. LNG liquefies at 111.6 K. Unlike many applications of cryogenics, the motivation for...

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...

Cryogenics in Space

Peter Kittel University of California-Berkeley pkittel@cal.berkeley.edu Space Cryogenics is the application of cryogenics to space missions. These applications fall into two broad areas, supporting space science missions and supporting the space transportation infrastructure. Science applications: The atmosphere is opaque to much of the electro-magnetic spectrum. In space, the absence of...

Cryosurgery

Review of Cryosurgery Boris Rubinsky, PhD Hebrew University School of Science and Engineering Research Center for Biomedical Engineering 78b Ross Building Givat Ram, Jerusalem 91904 Israel rubinsky@cs.huji.ac.il as published in Annual Review of Biomedical Engineering, August 2000, Vol. 2, pp. 157-187. Abstract: Cryosurgery is a surgical technique that employs freezing...

Liquefied Natural Gas

Liquefied Natural Gas as it relates to the Field of Cryogenics John W. Bonn VJ Systems, LLC johnbonn@vjsystems-lic.com Today the world is looking for a cleaner fuel and Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plays a large part in achieving this goal. LNG in a liquid form is at -162°C (-259°F) and...