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Around the Labs – A Road Trip to Cryogenic Facilities

Cryogenics remains an integral part of research conducted at several Department of Energy National Labs, from novel cryostats used to cool telescope equipment to the dilution refrigerators driving nanoparticle studies. SLAC – Menlo Park CA The SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, for example, is no stranger to cryogenics. Researchers there are...

Cryoport Signs Strategic Partnership Deal With Worthington Industries

Cryoport, Inc. has entered into a strategic partnership with Worthington Industries, bringing together two established cold chain companies. Cryoport provides logistics solutions for a range of industries including biopharma, animal health and reproductive medicine, while Worthington, through its recently-acquired CryoScience by Taylor Wharton product line, manufactures cold chain storage, transport...

Phase Transitions in the Extreme – Gallium Arsenide at 12mK

Researchers from Purdue University have demonstrated a phase transition that crosses two different phase categories, a result never observed before and one that could in time profoundly influence our understanding of matter and phases of matter. The transition from a topologically ordered to a broken symmetry phase was unexpected, and...

Bulk Storage and Shipping of Liquid Hydrogen is Hazardous

Hydrogen is very attractive as a green fuel because it burns in air to produce only water—and possibly some nitrogen oxides and hydrides—and therefore has a zero carbon footprint. As an energy store and fuel, liquid hydrogen has a high ratio of combustion energy per unit weight and is particularly...

Breakthrough Initiatives Announces Starshot, Its Light-Sail Starship of Tomorrow

Renowned cosmologist Stephen Hawking and other distinguished researchers joined internet investor and science philanthropist Yuri Milner at One World Observatory to announce a new Breakthrough Initiatives project focused on space exploration and the search for life in the Universe. Called Starshot, the $100 million research and engineering program aims to...

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Mixed Refrigerant Cycles

Most cryogenic refrigeration systems, both large scale systems and cryocoolers, use helium as a working fluid. There are a number of advantages to helium, not the least of which is that helium remains a fluid down to the lowest achievable temperatures. In order to freeze helium, pressures of over 20...

Fountain Pumps and He II Phase Separators

Helium II (He II), the second liquid phase of the 4He isotope described in this column in Cold Facts Spring 2010 (http://2csa.us/he2), can be modeled as consisting of two interpenetrating fluids. One, the superfluid component, has zero viscosity and entropy and the other, the normal fluid component, has nonzero viscosity...

Turboexpanders

A vital technology in the refrigerators and liquefiers described in Cold Facts Volume 31 Number 3 is that of turboexpanders. These devices are rotating machines in which the process fluid (e.g., helium) does work against the turboexpander while moving from high pressure to a lower pressure and thus is cooled....

Magnetic Levitation

From http://www.superconductors.org. Magnetic-levitation is an application where superconductors perform extremely well. Transport vehicles such as trains can be made to “float” on strong superconducting magnets, virtually eliminating friction between the train and its tracks. Not only would conventional electromagnets waste much of the electrical energy as heat, they would have...

Superconductivity

From Superpower website. History of Superconductivity Superconductivity was discovered in 1911 by the Dutch physicist, Heike Kammerlingh Onnes when he was able to liquefy helium by cooling it to 4 Kelvin, or -452°F. This enabled him to cool other materials close to absolute zero and investigate their electrical properties. He...

Medical Applications of Cryogenics

Neutron Therapy Cryogenics is at the heart of nuclear accelerators. Accelerators such as Fermilab’s Tevatron make neutron therapy for cancer possible. From Fermilab Today 4/20/09: Fermilab currently offers neutron therapy. But staff at Fermilab designed and built the proton accelerator used by the nation’s first hospital-based treatment center to use...

Nuclear Physics

Al Zeller National Superconducting Cyclotron Lab (NSCL) at Michigan State University zeller@nscl.msu.edu Cryogenics has a long history in nuclear physics. The technology has its origins in the use of cold traps for maintaining a vacuum, which is required to prevent beam loss and for generating high voltages used in acceleration....

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...